WILLIAM THE THIRD.

35

Of the four the chief was Trenchard. He was by callinga pamphleteer, and seems not to have been aware that'the sharpness of style and of temper which may betolerated in a pamphlet is inexcusable in a state paper.He was certain that he should be protected and rewardedby the party to which he owed his appointment, and wasdelighted to have it in his power to publish, with perfectsecurity and with a semblance of official authority, bitterreflections on King and ministry, Dutch favourites,French refugees, and Irish Papists. The consequencewas that only four names were subscribed to the report.The three dissentients presented a separate memorial.As to the main facts, however, there was little or no dis-pute. It appeared that more than a million of Irishacres, or about seventeen hundred thousand Englishacres, an area equal to that of Middlesex, Hertfordshire,Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, and Huntingdonshire to-gether , had been forfeited during the late troubles. Butof the value of this large territory very different estimateswere formed. The commissioners acknowledged thatthey could obtain no certain information. In the absenceof such information they conjectured the annual rent tobe about two hundred thousand pounds, and the feesimple to be worth thirteen years’ purchase, that is tosay, about two millions six hundred thousand pounds.They seem not to have been aware that much of the landhad been let very low on perpetual leases, and that muchwas burdened with mortgages. A contemporary writer,

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