MR. PATRICK O'BRIENI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he will state at how many years' purchase of the Government valuation a tenant, named Daniel M'Coy, of Cooltown, County Limerick, has purchased his farm from Lord Guillamore under the Ashbourne Act; whether he is aware that M'Coy made, through Mr. Nicholas H. Darcy, a previous offer to purchase the same farm, which the Land Commissioners refused to sanction; what terms did M'Coy offer; and why did the Commissioners withhold their sanction?
§ * MR. JACKSONThe Irish Land Commissioners report that no such person as Daniel M'Coy appears to have purchased a farm on the estate mentioned in the question. Mrs. Margaret M'Coy, the Commissioners report, purchased under the section of the Act of 1891 as an evicted tenant. The purchase money was £1,250, being 18½ years' purchase on the tenement valuation, and 15½ years of the previous rent. The Commissioners are not aware that Daniel M'Coy or Mrs. M'Coy made any previous offer to purchase through Mr. Darcy; but in 1888 they received an application from Mr. Darcy to purchase on his own account, and this was refused by the Commissioners because it did not appear that he was the bonâ fide tenant of the holding and did not appear to have stock of his own to work the farm, and because in the preceding year two farms held by him had been sold under execution.
§ * MR. JACKSONI have no information as to that.