Ireland has passed through a revolution in the Victorian age--Material progress--Dublin--Belfast--Improvement in Catholic places of worship and in the habitations of the people--State of the Irish community--Symptoms of retrogression--Decline of agriculture--The progress of Ireland much less than that of England and Scotland, and why--State of the Irish land system--Recent legislation has done some good, but it has been unjust, and has had pernicious effects--Ireland divided into three peoples--Notwithstanding great reforms Catholic Ireland is still, in the main, disaffected--Presbyterian Ireland--Cry for the confiscation of the Irish land--Protestant Ireland--Fall of its old ascendency--Discontent among the landed gentry--Nature of the government of Ireland by the Imperial Parliament--Its merits and defects--Attitude of the greater part of Ireland towards it--The administration of Irish affairs--The bureaucracy of the Castle--The Anglican, Presbyterian, and Catholic Irish Churches--The administration of justice in Ireland--Irish literature and public opinion--General survey of the present state of Ireland--Irish policy of Lord Salisbury's ministry--'Present Irish Questions' to be discussed in this work. To understand thoroughly the Ireland of the present day, it is necessary to have studied her history in the past. Nevertheless, if we go back to a comparatively recent period, say to the beginning of the reign of Victoria, we can obtain a reasonably clear idea of her existing condition. A revolution has passed over her in this space of time almost as complete as the revolution which has transformed France; the results have not yet been fully developed, but in nearly all respects they have been immense. The community has, for the most part, made material progress; but this has been far from great or decisive; it has been interrupted by seasons of distress, one culminating in a dire catastrophe, and has been retarded by many causes of trouble. Taking the external aspect of Ireland first, Dublin has certainly advanced in the last sixty years; the capital has been surrounded by fine and increasing suburbs; the squares, the streets, the shops have improved; above all, though much remains yet to be done, the contrast between the dwellings of the rich and the poor is much less painful than it was within living memory. No city, however, has made such progress as Belfast: its population, which, in 1841, was not more than 75,000 souls, was, in 1891, upwards of 255,000;[1] its opulence has probably grown tenfold; it is the centre of the great manufacture of Ulster; its building-yards are renowned for its magnificent ships; its estuary is crowded with the thronging fleets of commerce. The towns dependent on it, too, and the whole adjoining region, are flourishing from the great trade in linen, which has been aggregated