§ MR. SWIFT MACNEILLI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland whether his attention has been directed to the fact that the Mill holding at Ardara, county Donegal, for years in the possession of the Evans family, was taken possession of by the landlord, by whom the tentant, Mr. Evans, was evicted through inability to pay the rent in 1885, the offers of settlement made by the tenant short of payment of the full rent and 1283 the costs being refused by the landlord, although two attempts of the tenant to dispose of the holding by auction failed; whether he is aware that this holding remained vacant till October, 1904, when a petty sessions clerk, named Hugh Kennedy, was put into possession by Mr. Tredennick, the landlord, at a nominal rent; and whether having regard to the fact that the former tenant, on the passing of the Land Act of 1896, made an application for reinstatement, and has now made application to the Estates Commissioners for reinstatement, steps will be taken to secure the reinstatement of Mr. Evans in this holding.
MR. BRYCEThe Estates Commissioners inform me that they have received an application for reinstatement as an evicted tenant from Mr. John Evans, who states that in 1885 he was evicted from a corn and flax mill, with house and one and a half acres of land on the estate referred to. The Commissioners have no further information in the matter, bat it does not appear to them that the holding in question is one to which the Land Law Acts apply, and the case would not, therefore, come within the provisions of Section 2 of the Act of 1903. In reply to a further question as to whether this case could not be brought under the definition section Mr. Bryce said it was a question of law and the Estates Commissioners had apparently decided that the case was not one they could deal with.