For instance, townlands were chiefly in the hands of
separate proprietors, of whom many were absentees, whose consent it
would be almost impossible to obtain; others were lunatics, infants,
tenants for life, in which cases impediments existed to the obtaining of
the required guarantee; others again were embarrassed; some, too, might
prefer the work on the public roads to private works, and their
opposition could counteract the wishes of the majority. 4. In practice
it could not be expected, that a proprietor would submit both to the
direct charge incurred for drainage or other improvement of his
property, and likewise to that proportion of the general rate, which
would be cast upon him by the refusal of other proprietors to undertake
their own portion. Such a state of things would not only involve the
enterprising proprietor in a double expense, but would, in precisely the
same proportion, relieve his negligent neighbours from their allotted
share of the burthen.
The memorialists, therefore, prayed that each proprietor, or combination
of two or more proprietors, who might be willing to charge their
proportion of the rate for employing the poor upon any particular land
to be improved thereby, should be relieved to that extent, from the
payment of rate, and that the works so to be undertaken should not be
confined to drainage or subsoiling, but might include all works of a
productive nature, suited to the wants of the locality for which they
were proposed, provided only, that such works should meet the
approbation of the Board of Works.
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