" So that by this carefully prepared clause, the head of a
family who happened to hold a single foot of ground over one rood, was
put outside the pale of relief, with his whole family. A more complete
engine for the slaughter and expatriation of a people was never
designed. The previous clause offered facilities for emigrating to those
who would give up their land--the quarter-acre-clause compelled them to
give it up, or die of hunger. In the fulness of his generosity Mr.
Gregory had, he said, originally intended to insert "half an acre" in
the clause, but, like many well-intentioned men, he was over-ruled: he
had, he said, been lately in Ireland, and people there who had more
knowledge of the subject than he could lay claim to, told him half an
acre was _too extensive_, so he made it a quarter of an acre. It is not
hard to conjecture who his advisers were on this occasion.
This clause met with more opposition than the former one, but only from
a small band of kind, good-hearted men, Smith O'Brien called it a cruel
enactment; but as he had heard the Government were for it, he knew, he
said, to remonstrate against it was useless. Mr. Curteis, the member for
Rye, said the clause was meant for the benefit of Irish landlords--a
class that deserved little sympathy from the House or the country.
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