lies along distinctively Irish lines, and that otherwise it will not be trodden by the Irish people.  Much good in the same direction has been done, too, by the generous and authoritative admission by England that the future development of Ireland should be assisted and promoted ’with a full and constant regard to the special traditions of the country.’[52] But after all, while these concessions to Irish sentiment, vitally important though they be, may speed us on our road to national regeneration, they will not take us far.  It remains for us Irishmen to realise—­and the chief value of all the work I have described consists in the degree in which it forces us to realise—­the responsibility which now rests with ourselves.  We have been too long a prey to that deep delusion, which, because the ills of the country we love were in past days largely caused from without, bids us look to the same source for their cure.  The true remedies are to be sought elsewhere; for, however disastrous may have been the past, the injury was moral rather than material, and the opportunity has now arrived for the patient building up again of Irish character in those qualities which win in the modern struggle for existence.  The field for that great work is clear of at least the worst of its many historic encumbrances.  Ireland must be re-created from within.  The main work must be done in Ireland, and the centre of interest must be Ireland.  When Irishmen realise this truth, the splendid human power of their country, so much of which now runs idly or disastrously to waste, will be utilised; and we may then look with confidence for the foundation of a fabric of Irish prosperity, framed in constructive thought, and laid enduringly in human character.

THE END.

FOOTNOTES: 

[48] Pages 38, 39.

[49] It must be borne in mind that the Department is not officially concerned with the question of the economic distribution of land referred to on pp. 46-49.

[50] For a full description of the Department’s scheme of agricultural education I may refer to a Memorandum on Agricultural Education in Ireland, written by the author and published by the Department, July, 1901.

[51] See ante, pp. 236-238.

[52] Speech of the Lord Lieutenant to the Incorporated Law Society, November 20th, 1902.  See also p. 170.

INDEX

A.E. (George W. Russell) 200
Agitation as a policy, 82, 83
Agricultural Board, 228, 234, seq. 269
Agriculture:—­
  Agricultural Holdings:—­
    Improvement of, 46 seq. 
    Transfer of peasants to new farms, 48 seq. 
  Agricultural Organisation: 
    Denmark, 131
    Department of Agriculture and farmers’ societies, 211
    England, Mr. Hanbury’s and Lord Onslow’s views, 242
    Irish Agricultural Organisation