McGrath makes a good point. Others will have more knowledge about Ireland than I would so is a different case from Scotland. It is going down the wrong route though to blame "the English" for the Highland Clearances in Scotland though. There were of course some of the landlords who were English. Most notably the Duke of Sutherland but remember he was only in that position because he married the Duchess who was a native Scot. It was a class issue and the vast bulk of the people who carried it out were themselves Scottish landowners. There was not an alien English landed class in Scotland - only an anglicised one. Often if not blaming the English then the Lowlanders will be blamed but again though there were a more Lowlanders involved than English the facts are that many of the clearers were the native Highland Lairds themselves. If a Highland chief becomes anglicised and remote from his people it doesn't mean that the English are to blame for his actions.

The Scottish Gaelic poet Sorley MacLean writes about this in his book "Ris A Bhruthaich" which is a critique of earlier Gaelic poetry "It is only too common a feature of Gaelic poetry to blame Englishmen and Lowlanders for the crimes of Highland chiefs. This tendency gets an absurd expression in Mairi Mhor's wish to drive the Sasunnaich from Skye, where nearly all the principle Clearers had names at least as Gaelic as her own"

I've not got it to hand either (so can't remember which chief it is) but there is an interesting bit from James Hogg's diary. The Borders Shepherd is invited up to the Highlands to the estate of a chief and whilst walking is asked how many sheep he thought could be kept on the estate and what kind of profit could be made. Hogg gives an estimate of kinds. Then the company come to a burn (ie small stream) where Hogg crosses. The laird however sends one of his men back quite a distance to fetch another man - and they then lift the chief up and carry him across the burn. Hogg is amazed and says to the chief "do what you will but don't expect to be treated so by a Borders shepherd should you bring one here" He remarks in his writings that the landowner was "like an emperor with as much power as Napoleon in his own domain".