So also are the bonds which bind the tenant, who will sell the property so acquired when he shall have found that that for which he pays L8 per annum shall have become worth L10 in the market. It is useless to argue with the commissioners, or with the Government, as to the inexpediency of such an attempt to alter the laws for governing the world, which have forced themselves on the world's acceptance. Many such attempts have been made to alter these laws. The Romans said that twelve per cent. should be the interest for money. A feeling long prevailed in England that legitimate interest should not exceed five per cent. It is now acknowledged that money is worth what it will fetch; and the interests of the young, the foolish, and the reckless, who are tempted to pay too much for it, are protected only by public opinion. The usurer is hated, and the hands of the honest men are against him. That suffices to give the borrower such protection as is needed. So it is with landlords and tenants. Injury is no doubt done, and injustice is enabled to prevail here and there. But it is the lesser injury, the lesser injustice, which cannot be prevented in the long run by any attempt to escape the law of "_caveat emptor_." It is, however, vain to talk to benevolent commissioners, or to a Government working by eloquence and guided by philanthropy, regardless of political economy. "Would you have the heart," asks the benevolent commissioner, "to evict the poor man from his small holding on which he has lived all his life, where his only sympathies lie, and send him abroad to a distant land, where his solitary tie will be that of labour?" The benevolent commissioner thus expresses with great talk and with something also of the eloquence of his employers the feeling which prevails on that side of the question. But that which he deprecates is just what I could do; and having seen many Irishmen both in America and in Ireland, I know that the American Irishman is the happiest man of the two. He eats more; and in much eating the happiness of mankind depends greatly. He is better clothed, better sheltered, and better instructed. Though his women wail when he departs, he sends home money to fetch them. This may be for the profit of America. There are many who think that it must therefore be to the injury of England. The question now is whether the pathetic remonstrance of the tear-laden commissioner should be allowed to prevail. I say that the tenant who undertakes to pay for land that which the land will not enable him to pay had better go,--under whatever pressure.