Above : Maynooth College, Founded In This Period

The population of Ireland at the time of the passing of the Act of Union is estimated as something between 40 and 45 millions. In spite of the wave of relative prosperity which marked the closing decades of the eighteenth century, there was much poverty, both in the urban and in the rural districts. The land laws, in many of their worst features, remained still unreformed, but long leases or freeholds could now be given to Catholics. A freehold of 40s. in annual value conferred the franchise on its possessor, and as Catholics were now (since 1793) voters, astute landlords considered it their interest to increase their own political weight by the multiplication of such tenures.