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SOCIALISM  m  ENGLAND.

mentioned  as  having  organized  Mr.  George’s  lecturing  campaign. ­
  This  society,  which  has  lately  taken  the  name  of  the
English  Land  Restoration  League,”  derives  its  inspiration
from  “Progress  and  Poverty.”  It  has  at  present  only  two
branches  actually  formed,  one  at  Plymouth,  and  one  in  the
borough  of  Finsbury  (London)  ;  but  Mr.  Verinder,  the  secretary ­
  of  the  League,  informs  me  that  “  arrangements  are  nearly
completed  for  branches  in  Carlisle,  and  among  the  English  and
American  residents  in  Paris.”  He  further  says  that  kindred
Leagues,  not  actually  branches,  exist  at  Hull,  Birmingham,
Leeds,  etc.  This  League  differs  from  Mr.  Wallace’s  Society  on
the  question  of  compensation,  by  declaring  that  it  “  cannot
tolerate  the  idea  that  the  people  of  England  shall  be  compelled
to  buy  back  the  land  which  is  theirs  by  natural  right,  or  to
compensate  those  who  now  appropriate  their  earnings  for  the
loss  of  power  to  appropriate  those  earnings  in  future.”  Following
  Mr.  George,  it  proposes  “  to  increase  taxation  on  land
until  the  whole  annual  value  is  taken  for  the  public  benefit.”
A  “Scottish  Land  Restoration  League”  has  also  been
formed  in  the  present  year  on  similar  lines  to  its  English
sister.  Both  Leagues  seem  to  be  influenced  by  the  Christian
Socialist  movement  ;  but  what  in  the  English  programme
appears  as  an  abstract  right,  is  called  in  the  Scotch  manifesto
“  a  gift  fresh  from  the  Creator  to  each  generation  whom  He
calls  into  being.  ’  The  Scotch  manifesto,  too,  magnanimously
says  that  it  will  not  raise  the  question  of  how  much  compensation ­
  the  landlords  should  pay  to  those  who  have  been  for  so
long  “unjustly  disinherited.”

An  attempt  has  been  made  to  form  a  similar  League  in
Ireland,  at  Belfast,  and  Mr.  Michael  Davitt,  the  original
founder  of  the  Land  League,  though  he  does  not  appear  to  have
connected  himself  with  the  “  Irish  Land  Restoration  Society,”
has  long  been  known  to  advocate  the  socialistic  system  as
opposed  to  the  “  reactionary  views  ”  of  Mr.  Parnell,  who  has
always  aimed  at  the  establishment  of  a  peasant  proprietary.
There  are  not  wanting  some  signs  of  a  split  on  this  question
among  the  Irish  agrarian  reformers,  but  Mr.  Parnell  has  the
farmers  with  him  almost  to  a  man.  They  want  to  get  their