*

tenacity to the old tongue of their fathers, in which their dearest and most ennobling recollections and traditions were enshrined.

There are, even in the present day, many estimable persons in Ireland of opinion that the publication of historic works tends to revive old prejudices and to awake bad feelings; had this idea prevailed among the more enlightened of other countries, literature would not now have to boast of the works of Scott, of Lamartine,

tue.

66

*The attachment of the Irish to their native language is very remarkable: we learn from a manuscript cited by Dr. Leland, sometime Fellow of the University of Dublin, that when, in former times, any of the clans were unable to withstand the hostile powers of the invaders, they used to claim the assistance of their neighbouring tribes, for the sake of the old tongue of the Gaels of Erinn;" an argument which never failed to elicit the desired reinforcements. It is a curious historical fact, that the Irish troops, who principally contributed to save the town of Louvain, in 1635, from the vigorous assault of the great French army under Marshals Chatillon and De Brezé, were, in that fearful contest, marshalled and commanded in the military terms which the language of their country supplied. A Latin writer of the seventeenth century, who was conversant with most of the European tongues, tells us that the Irish language "surpasseth in gravity the Spanish, in elegance the Italian, in colloquial charms the French, it equals, if it does not surpass, the German itself in inspiring terror. From the lips of the Irish preacher it is a bolt to arrest the evil-doer in the career of guilt, and to allure by its soft and insinuating tones to the paths of virThe witticism, the jest, and the epigram it expresses briefly; and, in the hands of the poet, it is so pliant and flexible, that the Uraiceacht na n-eigeas,' or 'Precepts of the Poets,' lays down rules for more than a hundred different kinds of metre; so that in the opinion of men who are well acquainted with several languages, Irish poetry does not yield, either in variety, construction, or polish of its metres, to the poetry of any nation in Europe. Spenser himself corroborates this opinion, when he says: 'I have caused divers of Irish poems to be translated unto me, that I might understand them, and surely they savoured of sweet wit and good invention; they are sprinkled with some pretty flowers of natural device, which gave good grace and comeliness to them.'' "To maintain for themselves the manners and traditions of their fathers," says the great French historian, against the efforts of the invaders, the Irish made for themselves monuments which neither steel nor fire could destroy; they had recourse to the art of singing, in which they gloried in excelling, and which in the times of independence had been their pride and pleasure. The bards and minstrels became the keepers of the records of the nation. Wandering from village to village, they carried to every hearth memoirs of ancient Erinn; they studied to render them agreeable to all tastes and all ages; they had war songs for the men, love ditties for the women, and marvellous tales for the children of the mansion. Every house preserved two harps ever ready for travellers, and he who could best celebrate the liberty of former times, the glory of patriots, and the grandeur of their cause, was rewarded by a more lavish hospitality. The kings of England endeavoured more than once to strike a blow at Ireland in this last refuge of its regrets and hopes; the wandering poets were persecuted, banished, delivered up to tortures and death; but violence only served to irritate indomitable wills: the art of

and of Manzoni. Such an argument, moreover, strikes at the dissemination of TRUTH, and has, we know by sad examples, led, in Continental countries, to results most disastrous to the liberties of mankind. It is an incontrovertible fact, that political animosities have, in all nations, been designedly engendered and fostered by the propagation of historic falsehoods, which are ever ready to usurp the place unoccupied by truth. The contemplation of the

singing and of poetry had its martyrs like religion; and the remembrances, the destruction of which was desired, were increased by the feeling of how much they cost them to preserve."

In allusion to those penal times we find the following lines in a late anonymous writer :—

"Ah, God is good and nature strong-they let not thus decay

The seeds that deep in Irish breasts of Irish feeling lay;

Still sun and rain made emerald green the loveliest fields on earth,

And gave the type of deathless hope, the little shamrock, birth;

Still crouching 'neath the sheltering hedge, or stretched on mountain fern,

The teacher and his pupils met, feloniously-to learn;

Still round the peasant's heart of hearts his darling music twined,

A fount of Irish sobs or smiles in every note enshrined;

And still beside the smouldering turf were fond traditions told

Of heavenly saints and princely chiefs-the power and faith of old."

The native poets delighted to revile

-"the stranger's tongue upborne by law,

Whose phrase uncouth distorts the Gaelic jaw,"

and found endless pleasure in eulogizing their own language. As an illustration of this we may quote the following lines from one of the poems of Denis O'Mahony the Blind, a Munster bard of the last century :

"As iseadh ba bhlasda, ba cneasda, ba fhior-liomhtha,

Ba oilte, ba aite, ba thapadh a m-brigh bin ghuib;
Ba shnaighte, ba shnasghlaine racaireachd gaois-laoithe,
Ni h-ionan 's glafairneach mhallaighthe ar bh-fior-naimhde."
"Unlike the jargon of our foreign foe,

On raptur'd ear it pours its copious flow;
Most feeling, mild, polite, and polish'd tongue,
That learned sage e'er spoke or poet sung."

Mr. Christopher Anderson, a learned Scotch author, in his recently published work on the "Native Irish," labours to prove that the neglect of the Irish language has been alike injurious to the progress of English and that of general knowledge. Speaking of the natives he says, "the Irish is still the language of their hearts, and even of the best part of their understanding. In it they still continue to express their joy or sorrow; for this is the language which is associated with their earliest recollections. In it their mothers hushed them to rest in the days of their infancy; and in youth, if they loved music, they were charmed with the numbers of the Culan,' or of Erin go brath."" Bopp, Grimm, Diefenbach, and other profound German philologists, have borne testimony to the special importance of the Irish language, as being the richest in its vocabulary and grammatical forms, at the same time that it possesses the most ancient and numerous records, of the nature of histories, laws, and poems; and we may add, that the number of vocables in the Irish language exceeds 50,000.

history of our ancestors, their misfortunes, their virtues, their errors and their crimes, cannot fail to exercise a beneficial influence on us, their descendants, inasmuch as one of the great masters of the human mind has told us that "history is philosophy, teaching by example." Despite all obstacles, it is, however, pleasing to recollect, that even in the worst times a few men were to be found who, under most discouraging circumstances, at considerable personal sacrifices, and actuated solely by a love of their country's literature, essayed and achieved much for the preservation of our historic documents: the names of Ussher, Ware, Colgan, Fleming, and Ward must ever be remembered with gratitude as the first who, by their elegant Latin treatises, rendered the ancient history of Ireland familiar to the learned of Europe. Since the seventeenth century the study of Irish literature has never been entirely neglected, but notwithstanding all the efforts of individuals, the greatest and most important monuments of the early history of the country are still unpublished and inaccessible. A short view of these documents will give an idea of the obstacles which still continue to oppose the production of a true "History of Ireland."

From the earliest period of which we have any account, to the commencement of the seventeenth century, the native Irish, or Gaels, were governed by a peculiar written code, known as the Brehon laws. These laws are referred to by Venerable Bede, by the ante-Danish poets, by Cenfaelad in the seventh century, by Probus in the tenth, by Tighernach in the eleventh, and by the Magnates Hiberniæ in the fourteenth century. Placed in the extremity of Europe, secluded from the rest of the world, unconquered, unmixed, and never affected by the concussions of the fall of the Roman Empire, the Irish must have possessed primeval institutions, which these documents are best calculated to unfold.* Many copies of these laws are still preserved in our public libraries, and are in general accompanied by elaborate glosses and commentaries, written for the most part by the Irish jurists of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The contents of the Brehon laws still remaining to us†

* Bibliotheca Mscta Stouensis.

are very

Suggestions with a view to the Transcription and Publication of the MSS. of the Brehon Laws, now in the Libraries of the British Museum,

various, and may be found to have important bearings upon the existing condition of society in Ireland. Some relate to offences against person and property; and regulate in the most minute manner, the fines to be paid by the offenders, as well as the compensations to be received by the injured parties, or their representatatives. Others prescribe the prices to be paid for work done, or articles purchased. A very interesting class of laws lays down the privileges attaching to persons in the different ranks of society. Others have reference to the distribution and transfer of land. It must be apparent that documents of such a nature are of great importance; not only as illustrating the customs and character of the ancient Irish, but even as throwing light upon the earliest and most obscure part of European history. As the Celtic nations retired westward before the pressure of new colonizing swarms, they carried with them into the British islands much of their primitive language and usages. The former remains to this day. It is therefore unreasonable to deny the probability of their having also preserved such remnants of the latter, as might serve to supply the philosophic historian with valuable materials. It ought to be added, that the study of comparative philology would be promoted in no ordinary way by the publication of the ancient Irish laws. They are written in a dialect almost as different from the vernacular Irish of the present day, as Anglo-Saxon is from English.* They

the University of Oxford, the Royal Irish Academy, and Trinity College, Dublin. 12mo. London: 1851.

*The name of Brehon is cognate with the Celtic noun Breath or Breah, which signifies a judicial decision. The language of those laws is so peculiar and so long obsolete, that there are but two scholars to be found capable of deciphering and translating them, with accuracy and precision : it is scarcely necessary to say, that we refer to Dr. John O'Donovan and Mr. Eugene Curry. The latter gentleman, whose examination before the Parliamentary Committee of Public Libraries, in 1849, excited so much interest in England relative to the ancient literature of Ireland, has amassed an immense amount of collateral illustrative matter, for the elucidation of the laws of the Brehons, and has also compiled extensive and invaluable glossaries of the most unusual and obscure terms with which they abound. Although Mr. Curry has not hitherto taken a prominent public part in the Irish literary world, those who are competent to form a judgment, coincide in pronouncing him the most erudite Celtic palæographer ever produced by Ireland, not even excepting Mac Firbis, the O'Clerighs, or the O'Maoilchonaires. His critical knowledge of the older and more obscure dialects of the country, is perfectly unequalled and unprecedented. There is scarcely an important Irish manuscript in Great Britain or Ireland, or in the rich

abound, too, in technical terms and titles of persons, which are obviously among the most unvarying parts of a language. From no source could the scholar engaged in analyzing the Celtic languages, and determining their relation to the other branches of

Library of the Dukes of Burgundy, which he has not examined, collated, or transcribed, and in every Irish historical work of consequence, produced within the last quarter of a century, we find the authors expressing their numerous obligations to him for invaluable Celtic information, of which he is the sole depository. The critical and analytical Catalogues which he has compiled of the Gaelic manuscripts of the Royal Irish Academy, and of those in the British Museum, would alone entitle him to a high literary position. He has lately completed his examination and collation of the Betham manuscripts, added to our National Collection through the exertions of the Rev. Charles Graves; to the public subscription for which we are proud to state, that the Right Hon. B. L. Guinness, Lord Mayor of Dublin, was one of the most munificent contributors; thus opening a new era in our civic annals, and giving an example, which will, we trust, not be lost on his successors in office. Mr. Curry is now engaged in collating the fragments of the ancient Brehon laws, preserved in the English manuscript collections; and we trust that he will soon proceed to press with his treatises on the "History of the Boromean Tribute," and the "Account of the Fir-Bolgic, or Belgic Colony in Ireland"-two documents of the greatest importance in illustrating the earlier portions of our annals. When we recollect the uncertainty of human life, and how much the records of Ireland have suffered at various periods by accidents, and consider that, as in the case of the Escurial, a fire of a few minutes' duration in one of our manuscript collections, might effectually destroy the entire historical monuments of an important era, we cannot avoid expressing our deep anxiety, that public steps should be taken for the prompt publication of our ancient annals and literary remains, while they are yet in a state of safety, and while the scholars are amongst us, whose departure from the stage of life would leave the older Celtic records of Ireland a blank for ever. "The losses of history, indeed," says Gibbon, "are irretrievable; when the productions of fancy or science have been swept away, new poets may invent, and new philosophers may reason; but, if the inscription of a single fact be once obliterated, it cannot be restored by the united efforts of genius and industry. The consideration of our past losses should invite the present age to cherish and perpetuate the valuable relics which have escaped." This is truly a national question, and demands the attention of our educated classes. The literary men of Europe look to Ireland for the ancient monuments of her Celtic language; and we shall stand eternally disgraced in the republic of letters, if we make not a strenuous effort to supply them with what they have so long and so earnestly demanded. "Il est temps," says Adolphe Pictet, one of the latest and most distinguished French philologers, "de trancher enfin cette question: l'ancienneté de ces idiomes, le nombre et l'importance historique de leurs monuments écrits, presque inconnus encore, le fait qu'ils renferment une partie des origines de la langue Française; tout se réunit pour réveiller l'intérêt sur ces curieux débris de la primitive Europe. En attendant des travaux plus complets sur leur histoire, travaux qui ne peuvent être entrepris avec succès que par les savants nationaux, on peut, au moyen des matériaux existants les rattacher à leur véritable souche, qui est, sans contredit, Indo-Européene."