^^ ^y 7\ • fbl THE STORY OF THE NATIONS I2MO, ILLUSTRATED. PER VOL., $1.50 THE EARLIER VOLUMES ARE THE STORY OF GREECE. By Prof. Jas. A. Harrison THE STORY OF ROME. By Arthur Gilman THE STORY OF THE JEWS. By Prof. Jas. K. Hosmer THE STORY OF CHALDEA. By Z. A. Ragozin THE STORY OF GERMANY. By S. Baring-Gould THE STORY OF NORWAY. By Prof. H. H. Boyesen THE STORY OF SPAIN. By E. E. and Susan Hale THE STORY OF HUNGARY. By Prof. A. Vamb£ry THE STORY OF CARTHAGE. By Prof. Alfred J. Church THE STORY OF THE SARACENS. By Arthur Gilman THE STORY OF THE MOORS IN SPAIN. By Stanley Lane-Poole THE STORY OF THE NORMANS. By Sarah O. Jewett THE STORY OF PERSIA. By S. G. W. Benjamin THE STORY OF ANCIENT EGYPT. Bv Geo. Rawlinson THE STORY OF ALEXANDER'S EMPIRE. By Prof. J.P.Mahaffv THE STORY OF ASSYRIA. By Z. A. Ragozin THE STORY OF IRELAND. By Hon. Emily Lawless THE STORY OF THE GOTHS. By Henry Bradley For prospectus of the series see end of this volume G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON I^he feorg of tin ^ntiom THE ^'^^ Story of Ireland The Hon. EMILY LAWLESS AUTHOR OF " HURRISH: A STUDY," ETC WITH SOME ADDITIONS BY Mrs. ARTHUR BRONSON NEW YORK G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN 1888 l^^7 Copyright By G. p. Putnam's Sons 1887 Entered at Stationers' Ha!l, London By T. Fisher Unwin G. P. Putnam's Sons New York Co The earl OF DUFFERIN, K.P., G.C.B., F.R.S.. &c., Viceroy of India. Sgeul na H-Eireann DON Eireannach as fiu. PREFACE, Irish history is a long, dark road, with many blind alleys, many sudden turnings, many unaccountably crooked portions ; a road which, if it has a few sign- posts to guide us, bristles with threatening notices, now upon the one side and now upon the other, the very ground underfoot being often full of unsuspected perils threatening to hurt the unwary. To the genuine explorer, flushed with justified self- confidence, well equipped for the journey, and in- different to scratches or bruises, one may suppose this to be rather an allurement than otherwise, as he spurs along, lance at rest, and sword on side. To the less well-equipped traveller, who has no pretensions to the name of explorer at all, no particular courage to boast of, and whose only ambition is to make the way a little plainer for some one travelling along it for the first time, it is decidedly a serious impediment, so much so as almost to scare such a one from attempting the role of guide even in the slightest and least responsible capacity. X PREFACE. Another and perhaps even more formidable ob- jection occurs. A history beset with such distracting problems, bristling with such thorny controversies, a history, above all, which has so much bearing upon that portion of history which has still to be born, ought, it may be said, to be approached in the gravest and most authoritative fashion possible, or else not approached at all. This is too true, and that so slight a summary as this can put forward no claim to authority of any sort is evident enough. National " stories," however, no less than histories, gain a gravity, it must be remembered, and even at times a solemnity from their subject apart altogether from their treatment. A good reader will read a great deal more into them than the mere bald words con- vey. The lights and shadows of a great or a tragic past play over their easy surface, giving it a depth and solidity to which it could otherwise lay no claim. If the present attempt disposes any one to study at first hand one of the strangest and most perplexing chapters of human history and national destiny, its author for one will be more than content. CONTENTS. Primeval Ireland PAGE 1-12 Early migrations, i — The great ice age, 3 — Northern character of the fauna and flora of Ireland, 5 — First inhabitants, 6 — Formorian, Firbolgs, Tuatha-da-Danaans, 6 — Battle of Moy- tura Cong, 7-9 — The Scoto-Celtic invasion, 9 — Annals and annalists, how far credible? 9-12. II. The Legends and Legend-Makers T3-21 The legends, 13 — Their archaic character, 14 — The pursuit of G411a Dacker and his horse, 14-18 — -The ollamhs, 19 — Positions of the bards or ollamhs in Primitive Ireland, 19-21. III. Pre-Christian Ireland 22-31 Early Celtic law, 24 — The Senchus jSIor and Book of Aicill, 25 — Laws of inheritance, 26-28 — Narrow conception of patriotism, 30-31. Xll CONTENTS. PAGE IV. St. Patrick the Missionary .... 32-37 St. Patrick's birth, 33 — Capture, slavery, and escape, 33 — His return to Ireland, 33 — Arrives at Tara, 34 — Visits Connaught and Ulster, 34, 35 — Early Irish missionaries and their enthu- siasm for the work, 35-37. V. The First Irish Monasteries . . . 38-41 " The Tribes of the Saints," 38— Small oratories in the West, 39, 40 — Plan of monastic life, 40 — Ready acceptance of Christianity, 41. VI. Columba and the Western Church . . 42-49 Birth of Columba, 42 — His journey to lona, 42 — His character and humanity, 43 — Conversion of Saxon England, 44 — Schism between Western Church and Papacy, 45 — Synod of Whitby, 46 — The Irish Church at home, 47-49. VII. The Northern Scourge 5o-S9 Ireland divided into five kingdoms, 50 — The Ard-Reagh, 52 — Arrival of Vikings, 53 — Thorgist or Turgesius ? 55 — Later Viking invaders, 56 — The round towers, 56-58 — Dublin founded, 58 — Hatred between the two races, 59. VIII. Brian of the Tribute 60-70 Two deliverers, 60 — Defeat of the Vikings at Sulcost, 61 — Brian becomes king of Munster, 63 — Seizes Cashel, 63 — Over- comes Malachy, 63 — Becomes king of Ireland, 64 — Celtic theory of loyalty, 64 — Fresh Viking invasion, 66 — Battle of Clontarf, 67-69 — Death of Brian Boru, 69. CONTENTS. Xlll PAGE IX. From Brian to Strongbow .... 71-75 Result of Brian Boru's death, 71 — Chaos returns, 71 — Struggle for the succession, 73 — Roderick O'Connor, last native king of Ireland, 75. X. The Anglo-Norman Invasion .... 76-89 First group of knightly invaders, 76 — Their relationship, 76 — Giraldus Cambrensis, 78 — Motives for invasion, 79 — Papal sanction, 81 — Dermot McMurrough, 81 — He enlists recruits, 82 — Arrival of Robert FitzStephen, 83 — Wexford, Ossory, and Kilkenny captured, 84-S6 — Arrival of Strongbow, 86 — Struggle with Hasculph the Dane and John the Mad, 87 — Danes defeated, 87 — Dublin besieged, 88 — Strongbow defeats Roderick O'Connor, goes to Wexford, and embarks at Water- ford, 88— Meets the king, 88— Arrival of Henry II., 89. XI. Henry II. in Ireland ..... 90-92 Large military forces of Henry, 90 — The chiefs submit and do homage, 90, 91 — Irish theory of Ard-Reagh or Over-Lord, 91 — Henry in Dublin, 92 — Synod at Cashel, 92 — Henry recalled to England, 92. XH. Effects of the Anglo-Norman Invasion . 93-97 Effect of Henry's stay in Ireland, 93 — His large schemes, 94 — ■ Their practical failure, 95 — Rapacity of adventurers, 96 — Con- trast between Irish and their conquerors, 96 — Civil war from the outset, 96-97. XIH. John in Ireland ...... 98-100 John's first visit, 98 — His insolence and misconduct, 98— Re- called in disgrace, 98 — Second visit as king, 99 — His energy, 99 — Overruns Meath and Ulster, 99 — Returns to England, 99 — Effect of his visit, 100. XIV CONTENTS. PAGE XIV. The Lords Palatine 101-106 The Geraldines, loi — Their possessions in Ireland, 102 — The five palatinates, 103 — The heirs of Strongbow, 103 — The De Burghs, 104 — The Butlers, 105 — Importance of the great territorial owners in Ireland, 105, 106. XV. Edward Bruce in Ireland .... to 7-1 12 Want of landmarks in Irish history, 107 — Edward the I.'s reign, 107 — Battle of Bannockburn, 108 — Its effect on Ireland, 108 — Scotch invasion under Edward Bruce, 108 — Ravages and famine caused by him, 109 — The colonists regain courage : Battle of Dundalk, no— Edward Bruce killed, no — Result of the Scotch invasion, in, 112. XVI. The Statute of Kilkenny . . . .113-118 Reign of Edward III., 113 — A lost opportunity, 114 — Duke of Clarence sent to Ireland, 114 — Parliament at Kilkenny, 115 — Statute of Kilkenny, 115 — Its objects, 116 — Two Ire- lands, 116 — Weakness resorts to cruelty, 117 — Effects of the statute, 118. XVII. Richard II. in Ireland 11 9-1 24 Richard the II. 's two visits to Ireland, 119 — Utter dis- organization of the country, 1 19-120 — The chieftains submit and come in, 120 — "Sir Art" McMurrough, 120 — Richard leaves, and Art McMurrough breaks out again, 121 — Earl of March killed, 121 — Richard returns, 122 — Attacks Art McMurrough, 122 — Failure of attack, 122 — Recalled to Eng- land, 123 — His defeat and death, 123 — Confusion redoubles, 124. CONTENTS. XV PAGE XVIII. The Deepest Depths 1 25-1 31 Monotony of Irish history, 125 — State of Ireland during the Wars of the Roses, 126 — Pillage, carnage, and rapine, 126, 127 — The seaport towns, 128 — Richard Duke of York in Ireland, 128 — His conciliatory policy, 129 — Battle of Towton, 129 — The Kildares grow in power, 130 — Geroit Mor, 130 — His character, 131. XIX. The Kildares in the Ascendant . . 132-143 Effect of the battle of Bosworth, 132 — Kildare still in power, 132 — Lambert Simnel in Ireland, 132 — Crowned in Dublin, 134 — Battle of Stoke, 135 — Henry VII. pardons the rebels, 135 — Irish peers summoned to Court, 136 — Perkin Warbeck in Ireland, 137 — Quarrels between the Kildares and Ormonds, 138 — Sir Edward Poynings, 13S — Kildare's trial and acquital, 140 — Restored to power, 141 — Battle of Knocktow, 142, 143. XX. Fall of the House of Kildare . . . 144-150 Rise of Wolsey to power, 144 — Resolves to destroy the ^Geraldines, 144 — -Geroit Mor succeeded by his son, i45^Earl of Surrey sent as viceroy, 145 — Kildare i-estored to power, 146 — Summoned to London and imprisoned, 146 — Again restored and again imprisoned, 147 — Situation changed, 147 — Revolt of Silken Thomas, 147 — Seizes Dublin, 148 — Archbishop Allen murdered, 148 — Sir William Skeffington to Ireland, 148 — Kildare dies in prison, 149 — " The Pardon of Maynooth," 149 — Silken Thomas surrenders, and is executed, 150. XXI. The Act of Supremacy 151-15S Lord Leonard Grey deputy, 151 — Accused of treason, re- called and executed, 152 — Act of Supremacy proposed, 152 — Opposition of clergy, 152 — Suppression of ihe abbeys, 153 — XVI CONTENTS. PAGE Great Parliament summoned in Dublin, 153 — Meeting of hereditary enemies, 154 — Conciliatory measures, 154 — Henry VIII. proclaimed king of Ireland and head of the Church, 155. XXII. The New Departure 156-160 A halcyon period, 156 — O'Neill, O'Brien, and Macwilliam of Clanricarde at Greenwich, 157 -Receive their peerages, 157 — Attempt at establishing Protestantism in Ireland, 158 — Vehemently resisted, 158 — The destruction of the relics, 159 — Archbishop Dowdal, 159 — The effect of the new departure, 159 — The Irish problem receives fresh complications, 160. XXIII. The First Plantations 1 61-163 Mary becomes queen, 161 — Religious struggle postponed, 161 — Fercal Leix and Offaly colonized, 162 — Sense of insecurity awakened, 162 — No Irish Protestant martyrs, 163 — Commis- sion of Dean Cole, 163 — Its failure, 163 — Death of Mary, 163. XXIV. ^~~Wars against Shane O'Neill . . . 164-173 Elizabeth becomes queen, 164 — Effect of change on Ireland, 165 — Shane O'Neill, 165 — His description, habits, qualities, 166 — His campaign against Sussex, 167 — Defeats Sussex, 167 — ^ His visit to Court, 168 — Returns to Ireland, 169 — Supreme in the North, 169 — His attack on the Scots, 170 — Sir Henry Sidney marches into Ulster, 171 — The disaster at Derry, 171 — Shane encounters the O'Donnells, 172 — Is defeated, 172 — Applies to the Scots, 172 — Is slain, 173. XXV. Between two Storms .,.-.. 174-180 Sir Heniy Sidney Lord-deputy, I74^A lull, 174 — Sidney's • policy and proceedings, 176— Provincial presidents appointed, CONTENTS. Xvii PAGE 176 — Arrest of Desmond, 177 — Sir Peter Carew, 178 — His violence, 178 — Rebellion in the South, 178 — -Sir James Fitz- maurice, 179 — Relations between him and Sir John Perrot, 179 — He surrenders, and sails for France, 180. XXVI. The Desmond Rebellion .... 181-192 An abortive tragedy, 181 — State of the Desmond Palatinate, 183 — Sir James Fitzmaurice in France and Spain, 183— Nicholas Saunders appointed legate, 184 — Stukeley's expedition, 184 — Fitzmaurice lands in Kerry, 184 — Desmond vacillates, 185 — Death of Sir James Fitzmaurice, 1S7 — Concerted attack of Ormond and Pelham, 1S8— Horrible destruction of life, 188 — Arrival of Spaniards at Smervvick, 189 — Lord Grey de AVilton, 189 — Defeat of English troops at Glenmalure, 190 — Attack of and slaughter of Spaniards at Smerwick, 190 — WTiolesale executions, 191 — Death of the Earl of Desmond and extinction of his house, 192. XXVII. Between two more Storms .... 193-202 State of Munster, 193 — The new plantations, 194 — Perrot's administration, 195 — Tyrlough Luinagh, 195— Sir William Fitzwilliam, 197 — Executions without trial, 198 — Alarm of nortliern proprietors, 198 — Earl of Tjnrone, 199 — Character of early loyalty, 200 — Causes of dissatisfaction, 201 — Quarrel with Bagnall. 201 — -Preparations for a rising, 201, 202. XXVIII. Battle of the Yellow Ford . . . 203-205 The Northern Black water, 203 — Attack of Blackwater Fort by Tyrone, 203 — Death of the deputy. Lord Borough, 203 — Bagnall advances from Dublin, 204 — Battle of the Yellow Ford, 205 — Defeat and death of Bagnall, 205— Retreat of the English troops, 205 — The rising becomes general, 205. XVlll CONTENTS. PAGE XXIX. The Essex Failure ..... 206-210 Essex appointed Lord-Lieutenant, 206— Arrival in Ireland, 208 — Mistakes and disasters, 208 — Death of Sir Conyers Clif- ford in the Curlews, 209 — Essex advances north, 209^Holds a conference with Tyrone, 209 — Agrees to an armistice, 209 — Anger of the Queen, 210 — Essex suddenly leaves Ireland, 210. XXX. End of the Tyrone War .... 21 1-2 19 Mountjoy appointed deputy, 21 1 — Contrast between him and Essex, 213 — Reasons for Mountjoy 's greater success, 213 — Conquest by starvation, 214 — Success of method, 214 — Arrival of Spanish forces at Kinsale : Mountjoy and Carew marched south and invests Kinsale, 215 — Attack of Mountjoy by Tyrone, 218 — Failure of attack, 218 — Surrender of Spaniards, 218 — Surrender of Tyrone, 219. XXXL The Flight of the Earls .... 220-225 The last chieftain rising against England, 220 — Condition of affairs at close of war, 221 — Tyrone's position impossible, 221 — Reported plot, 222 — Tyrone and Tyrconnel take flight, 222 — Confiscation of their territory, 223 — Sir John Davis, 224 — The Ulster Settlement, 224, 225. XXXIL The First Contested Election . , . 226-228 Parliament summoned, 226 — Anxiety of government to secure a Protestant majority, 226 — Contested election, 227 — Narrow Protestant majority, 227 — Furious quarrel over election of Speaker, 228 — Parliament dissolved, 228 — The king appealed to, 228 — Attainder of Tyrone and Tyrconnel, 228 — Reversal of statute of Kilkenny, 228. CONTENTS. XIX PAGE XXXIII. Old and New Owners 229-231 Further plantations, 229 — The Connaught landowners, 230 — Their positions, 231 — Charles I.'s accession and how it affected Ireland, 231 — Lord Falkland appointed viceroy, 231 — Succeeded by Wentworth, 231. XXXIV. Strafford . . . . ... 232-239 Arrival of Wentworth in Ireland, 232 — His methods and theory, 232 — Dissolves parliament, 234 — Goes to Connaught, 234 — Galway jury fined and imprisoned, 230 — His eccle- siastical policy, 237 — His Irish army, 238 — Return to England, 238 — Attainder, trial, and death, 239. XXXV. 'Forty-one 240-245 Confusion and disorder, 240 — Strafford's army disbanded, but still in the country, 241 — Plot to seize Dublin Castle, 241— Plot transpires, 242 — Sir Phelim O'Neill seizes Charlemont, 243 — Attack upon the Protestant settlers, 243 — Barbarities and counter barbarities, 244. XXXVI. The Waters Spread 246-250 The rising at first local, 246 — Attitude of the Pale gentry, 249 — They resolve to join the rising, 247 — Disorganization of the northern insurgents, 248 — Incapacity of Sir Phelim O'Neill, 248 — Arrival of Owen Roe O'Neill and Preston, 249 — Meeting of delegates at Kilkenny, 249— Charles decides upon a coup de main, 250. ^ XXXVII. Civil War 251-256 Effect of the Ulster massacres on England, 251 — An agrarian rather than religious rising, 252 — The Confederates' terms, XX CONTENTS. PAGE 253— Glamorgan sent to Ireland, 254— The secret treaty transpires, 254— Arrival of Rinucini, 255— Battle of Benturb, 255 — Ormond surrenders Dublin to the Parliament, 256. XXXVIII. The Confusion Deepens. .... 257-260 Total confusion of aims and parties, 258 — The "poor Panther" Inchiquin, 258 — Alliance between Jones and Owen Roe O'Neill, 259 — Ormond advances upon Dublin, 259 — Battle of Baggotrath and defeat of the Royalists, 260 — Arrival of Cromwell, 260. XXXIX. Cromwell in Ireland ..... 261-265 Cromwell's mission, 261 — Assault of Drogheda, and slaughter of its garrison, 261 — Wexford garrison slaughtered, 262 — Cromwell's discipline, 263 — The " country sickness," 263^ Confusion in the Royalist camp, 264 — Signature of the Scotch covenant by the king, 284— Final surrender of O'Neill and the Irish army, 265. XL. Cromwell's Methods 266-272 Loss of life during the eight years of war, 266 — Punishment of the vanquished, 267 — Executions, 267 — Wholesale scheme of eviction, 268 — The New Owners, 269 — "The Burren," 270 — Sale of women to the West Indian plantations, 270 — Dis- satisfaction amongst the soldiers and debenture holders, 271 — Irish Cromwellians, 272. __. XLI. The Act of Settlement. .... 273-276 The Restoration, 273 — Henry Cromwell, 273 — Coote and Broghill, 273— Court of claims established in Dublin, 275 — Prolonged dispute, 276 — Final settlement, 276 — Condition of Irish Roman Catholics at close of the struggle, 276. CONTENTS. XXI PAGE XLII. Oppression and Counter Oppression . . 277-283 Effects of the Restoration upon the Ulster Presbyterians, 277 — A new Act of Uniformity, 277 — Exodus of Presbyterians from Ireland, 278 — The Popish plot, 279 — Insane panic, 279 — Execution of Archbishop Plunkett, 279 — Sudden reversal of the tide, 280 — Tyrconnel sent as viceroy, 280 — Terror of Protestant settlers, 281 — William of Orange in England, 282 — ^James II. arrives in Ireland, 283. XLIII. William and James in Ireland . . . 284-294 Popular enthusiasm for Janies, 284 — Struggle between his English and Irish adherents, 285 — James advances to London- derry, 2S5 — Siege of Londonderry, 286 — Its garrison relieved, 286 — Debasing the coinage, 286 — Reversal of the Act of Settlement, 287 — Bill of Attainder, 287 — Arrival of William IIL, 288— Battle of the Boyne, 289— Flight of James, 289— First siege of Limerick, 291 — Athlone captured by Ginkel, 292— Battle of Aughrim, 293, 294. XLIV. The Treaty of Limerick .... 295-298 Sarsfield refuses to surrender, 295 — Second siege of Limerick, 295 — The Limerick treaty, 296 — Its exact purport, 296 — The military treaty, 297 — Departure of the exiles, 298. XLV, The Penal Code ...... 299-306 A new century and new fortunes, 299 — Mr. Lecky's " Eigh- teenth Century," 300 — Reversal of all the recent Acts, 300 — The Penal Code, 301 — Burke's description of it, 302 — How evaded, 303 — Its effects upon Protestants and Catholics, 304-306. XLVI. The Commercial Code .... 307-310 The " Protestant Ascendency," 307 — England's jealousy of XXU CONTENTS. PAGE her Colonists, 308 — Act passed prohibiting export of Irish woollen goods, 309 — Effects of the Act upon Ireland, 309 — Smuggling on an immense scale, 309 — Collapse of industry, 310 — Strained relations, 310. XLVII. MOLYNEUX AND SwiFT . . . . 311-319 The " Ingenious Molyneux," 311 — Irish naturalists, 312 — Molyneux's " Case of Ireland," 313 — Effect of its publication, 315 — Death of Molyneux, 315 — Dean Swift, 315 — His posi- tion in Irish politics, 315 — The " Drapier Letters," 317 — Their line of attack, 318 — Effect on popular opinion, 318 — Wood's halfpence suspended, 318. XLVIIL Henry Flood 320-327 Forty dull years, 320 — Parliamentary abuses, 322 — Charles Lucas, 322 — Flood enters Parliament, 323 — His struggle with the Government, 325 — Lord Townsend recalled, 325 — Flood accepts office, 326 — Effect of that acceptance, 326 — Rejoins the Liberal side, 326 — Tries to outbid Grattan, 326 — Failure and end, 327. XLIX. Henry Grattan 328-333 Unanimity of opinion about Grattan, 32S— His character, 328 — Enters Parliament, 330— The "Declaration of Rights," 330 — Carried by the Irish Parliament, 330 — Declaratory Act of George I. repealed, 331 — A spell of prosperity, 331 — Rocks ahead, 332 — Disaster following disaster, 332 — Grattan and the Union, 332 — Grattan's death, 333. The Irish Volunteers , . . . 334-340 Revolt of the American Colonies, 334 — Its effect on Ireland, 334 — Disastrous condition of the country, 335 — Volunteer movement begun in Belfast, 336 — Rapid popularity, 336 — Its effect upon politics, 338 — Free Trade, 338— Declaratory Act repealed, 338 — The Volunteers disband, 340. CONTENTS. xxill PAGE LI. Danger Signals 341-346 Reform the crying necessity of the hour, 341 — Corruption steadily increasing, 341 — Attempt to obtain free importation of goods to England, 342 — Its failure, 342 — Disturbed state of the country, 344 — Its causes, 344 — "White boys," "Oak boys," and "Steel boys," 344, 345 — Faction war in the North, 345 — Orange lodges, 345 — " Society of United Irishmen," 346 — The one hope for the future, 346. LI I. The Fitzwilliam Disappointment . . 347-353 General desire for Catholic Emancipation, 347 — Lord Shef- field's evidence, 347 — The Catholic delegates received by the king, 349 — Lord Fitzwilliam sent as Lord- Lieutenant, 350 — Popular enthusiasm, 350 — Recalled, 351 — Result of his recall, 352, 353. LIIL 'Ninety-eight 354-366 Wolfe Tone, his character and autobiography, 354 — The other leaders of the rebellion, 354 — England and France at war, 355 — Hoche's descent, 355 — Panic, 357 — Habeas Corpus Act suspended, 357 — Misconduct of soldiers, 359 — Arrest of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, 361 — Outbreak of the rebellion, 361 — The rising in Wexford, 362 — Bagenal Harvey, 363 — Arklow, New Ross, and Vinegar Hill, 363 — Suppression of the rebel- lion, 364 — Final incidents, 365 — Death of Wolfe Tone, 366. LIV. The Union 367-376 State of Ireland after the rebellion, 367, 368 — Pitt resolved to pass the Union, 370 — Inducements offered, 370 — Dis- crepancy of statements upon the subject, 371 — Bribery or not bribery ? 372 — Lord Cornwallis and Lord Castlereagh, 373 — The Union carried, 375. XXIV CONTENTS. PAGE LV. O'CONNELL AND CaTHOLIC EMANCIPATION . 377-389 The Union not followed by union, 277— The Emmett out- break, 377 — Young Daniel O'Connell, 379 — The new Catholic Association, 380 — The Clare election, 381 — Catholic Relief Bill carried, 381 — The "Incarnation of a people," 383 — Repeal, 384 — The O'Connell gatherings, 386 — The meeting proclaimed at Clontarf, 387 — Prosecution and condemnation of O'Connell, 387 — Released on appeal, 387 — Never regained his power, 388 — Despondency and death, 388, 389. LVI. "Young Ireland" 390-395 "The Nation," 390 — Sir C. Gavan Duffy, 390 — Thomas Davis, 390 — Smith O'Brien, 391 — Effect of O'Connell's death on the " Young Ireland " party, 392 — ^James Lalor, 393 — -His influence on Mitchell, 393 — The " United Irishmen " news- paper started, 394 — Arrest and transportation of Mitchell, 394 — The end of the " Young Ireland " movement, 395. LVII. The Famine 396-402 First symptoms of the potato disease, 396 — The fatal night, 396 — Beginning of Famine, 397 — Rapid mortality, 397 — Mr. Forster's reports, 398 — Relief works, 399 — Soup kitchens, 399 — Failure of preventive measures, 399 — Famine followed by ruin, 400 — Clearances and Emigration, 401 — Emigrant ships, 401 — Permanent effects of the Famine on Ireland, 402. LVIII. The Latest Development .... 403-416 Encumbered Estates Act, 403 — Tenant League of North and South, 403 — The "Brass Band," 404— A lull, 404— The Phoenix organization, 404 — The Fenian "scare," 405 — Rescue of Fenian prisoners at Manchester, 405 — The Clerkenwell explosion, 406 — The Irish Church Act, 406, 407 — The Irish CONTENTS. XXV PAGE Land Act of 1870, 407 — Failure of Irish Education Act, and retirement of the Liberals, 408— Mr. Butt and Mr. Parnell, 408 — The Land League established, 409 — Return of the Liberals to power, 409 — The Irish Land Act of 1881, 410 — Arrest and release of Land League Leaders, 411— Murders in the Phoenix Park, 411 — James Carey, 412 — His death, 412 — The agrarian struggle, 413 — Home Rule, 414 — Its eventual destiny, 414 — The untravelled Future, 416. LIX. Conclusion 417-419 Irish heroes, 417 — Causes of their want of popularity, 418 — Irish versus Scotch heroes, 418 — " Prince Posterity," 419. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. [Nearly all the archreological illustrations in this volume are from "The Early Christian Architecture of Ireland," by Miss M. Stokes, who has kindly allowed them to be reproduced. The portraits are chiefly from engravings, &c., kept in the Prints Room of the British Museum.] HOLY ISLAND, LOUGH DERG . MAP OF IRELAND IN REIGN OF HENRY VII. CROSS IN CEMETERY OF TEMPUL BRECCAN WEST CROSS, MONASTERBOICE . DOORWAY OF MAGHERA CHURCH KILBANNON TOWER . KELLS ROUND TOWER BASE OF TUAM CROSS DOORWAY OF KILLESHIN CHURCH INTERIOR OF CORMAC'S CHAPEL (CASHEL) WEST FRONT OF ST. CRONAN'S CHURCH . WEST DOORWAY OF FRESHFORD CHURCH SIR HENRY SIDNEY (PORTRAIT OF) . PAGE Frontispiece 134 39 SI 54 57 62 65 72 n 80 175 XXviii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. ASKEATON CASTLE CATHERINE, THE " OLD " COUNTESS OF DESMOND SIR JOHN PERROT (PORTRAIT OF) . CAHIR CASTLE (iN 1 599) CAPTURE OF THE EARL OF ORMOND BY THE O'MORES IRELAND IN THE REIGN OF JAMES I. . . . THOMAS WENTWORTH, EARL OF STRAFFORD, 164I ARCHBISHOP USSHER (PORTRAIT OF) . . . JAMES, DUKE OF ORMOND (PORTRAIT OF) HENRY CROMWELL (PORTRAIT OF) . " TIGER " ROCHE DEAN SWIFT (PORTRAIT OF) PHILIP, EARL OF CHESTERFIELD (PORTRAIT OF) . RIGHT HON. HENRY FLOOD (PORTRAIT OF) . RIGHT HON. HENRY GRATTAN, M.P. (PORTRAIT OF) JAMES CAULFIELD, EARL OF CHARLEMONT (PORTRAIT OF RIGHT HON, EDMUND BURKE (PORTRAIT OF) THE EARL OF MOIRA (" A MAN OF IMPORTANCE ") RIGHT HON. EDMUND BURKE (SKETCH FROM LIFE) THEOBALD WOLFE TONE (PORTRAIT OF) , LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD (PORTRAIT OF) THE FOUR COURTS, DUBLIN MARQUIS CORNWALLIS (PORTRAIT OF) . ROBERT EMMETT (PORTRAIT OF) DANIEL O'CONNELL, M.P. (SKETCH OF) . LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. XX ix LESSER ILLUSTRATIONS (at end of chapters). PAGE CROMLECH ON HOWTH 12 MOUTH OF SEPULCHRAL CHAMBER AT DOWTH . . 31 ST. Kevin's church 41 CORMAC'S CHAPEL AND ROUND TOWER . . . 70 ROUND TOWER AT DEVENISH 75 SOUTH WINDOW OF ST. CAEMIN's CHURCH ... 89 FIGURES ON KILCARN FONT 97 TRIM CASTLE . .112 FIGURES ON KILCARN FONT .... 131 AND 150 INITIAL LETTER (fROM THE BOOK OF KELLs) . . 160 ST. Patrick's bell 173 INITIAL letter (fROM THE BOOK OF KELLs) . . 202 cinerary URN 210 TARA BROOCH 219 DOORWAY OF ST. CAEMIN's CHURCH • .225 SHRINE OF ST. PATRICK'S BELL 239 ST. COLUMBA's ORATORY 265 INITIAL LETTER (fROM THE BOOK OF KELLs) . . 294 CRYPT OF CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL . . . 376 ^ THE STORY OF IRELAND. I. PRIMEVAL IRELAND. " It seems to be certain," says the Abbe McGeo- ghehan, "that Ireland continued uninhabited from the Creation to the Deluge." With this assurance to help us on our onward way I may venture to supple- ment it by saying that little is known about the first, or even about the second, third, and fourth suc- cession of settlers in Ireland. At what precise period what is known as the Scoto-Celtic branch of the great Aryan stock broke away from its parent tree, by what route its migrants travelled, in what degree of con- sanguinity it stood to the equally Celtic race or races of Britain, what sort of people inhabited Ireland previous to the fir.st Aryan invasion — all this is in the last degree uncertain, though that it was inhabited by some race or races outside the limits of that greatest of human groups seems from ethnological evidence to be perfectly clear. When first it dawns upon us through that thick 2 PRIMEVAL IRELAND. darkness which hangs about the birth of all countries — whatever their destiny — it was a densely wooded and scantily peopled island " lying a-loose," as old Campion, the Elizabethan historian, tells us, " upon the West Ocean," though his further assertion that " in shape it resembleth an egg, plain on the sides, and not reaching forth to the sea in nooks and elbows of Land as Brittaine doeth " — cannot be said to be quite geographically accurate — the last part of the description referring evidently to the east coast, the only one with which, like most of his country- men, he was at that time familiar. Geographically, then, and topographically it was no doubt in much the same state as the greater part of it remained up to the middle or end of the six- teenth century, a wild, tangled, roadless land, that is to say, shaggy with forests, abounding in streams, abounding, too, in lakes — far more, doubtless, than at present, drainage and other causes having greatly reduced their number — with rivers bearing the never- failing tribute of the skies to the sea, yet not so thoroughly as to hinder enormous districts from re- maining in a swamped and saturated condition, given up to the bogs, which even at the present time are said to cover nearly one-sixth of its surface. This superfluity of bogs seems always in earlier times to have been expeditiously set down by all historians and agriculturists as part of the general depravity of the Irish native, who had allowed his good lands," — doubtless for his own mischievous plea- sure — to run to waste ; bogs being then supposed to differ from other lands only so far as they were made GEOGRAPHY AND TOPOGRAPHY. 3 "waste and barren by superfluous moisture." About the middle of last century it began to be perceived that this view of the matter was somewhat inade- quate ; the theory then prevailing being that bogs owed their origin not to water alone, but to the destruction of woods, whose remains are found im- bedded in them — a view which held good for another fifty or sixty years, until it was in its turn effectually disposed of by the report of the Bogs Commission in 18 10, when it was proved once for all that it was to the growth of sphagnums and other peat-producing mosses they were in the main due — a view which has never since been called in question. A great deal, however, had happened to Ireland before the bogs began to grow on it at all. It had — to speak only of some of its later vicissitudes — been twice at least united to England, and through it with what we now know as the continent of Europe, and twice severed from it again. It had been exposed to a cold so intense as to bleach off all life from its surface, utterly depriving it of vegetation, and grinding the mountains down to that scraped bun -like outline which so many of them still retain ; had covered the whole country, highlands and lowlands alike, with a dense overtoppling cap of snow, towering often thou- sands of feet above the present height of the moun- tains, from which "central silence" the glaciers crept sleepily down the ravines and valleys, eating their way steadily seaward, and leaving behind them moraines to mark their passage, leaving also longi- tudinal scratches, cut, as a diamond cuts glass, upon the rocks, as may be seen by any one who takes 4 PRIMEVAL IRELAND. the trouble of looking for them ; finally reaching the sea in a vast sloping plateau which pushed its course steadily onward until its further advance was overborne by the buoyancy of the salt water, the ends breaking off, as the Greenland glaciers do to- day,- into huge floating icebergs, which butted against one another, jammed up all the smaller bays and fiords ; were carried in again and again on the rising tide ; rolled hither and thither like so many colossal ninepins ; played, in short, all the old rough- and-tumble Arctic games through many a cold and dismal century, finally melting away as the milder weather began slowly to return, leaving Ireland a very lamentable-looking island indeed, not unlike one of those deplorable islands scattered along the shores of Greenland and upon the edges of Baffin's Bay — treeless, grassless, brown and scalded, wearing everywhere over its surface the marks of that great ice-plough which had lacerated its sides so long. There seems to be good geological evidence that the land connection between Ireland and Scotland continued to a considerably later period than between it and England, to which, and as far as can be seen to no other possible cause is to be attributed two very striking characteristics of its fauna, namely, its excessive meagreness and its strikingly northern character. Not only does it come far short of the already meagre English fauna, but all the distinctively southern species are the ones missing, though there is nothing in the climate to account for the fact. The Irish hare, for instance, is not the ordinary brown hare of England, but the " blue " or Arctic hare of PAUNA AND FLORA. 5 Scotch mountains, the same which still further to the north becomes white in winter, a habit which, owing to the milder Irish winters, it has apparently shaken off. It would be pleasant to linger here a little over this point of distribution — so fruitful of suggestion as to the early history of the planet we occupy. To speculate as to the curious contradictions, or apparent contradictions, to be found even within so narrow an area as that of Ireland. What, for instance, has brought a group of South European plants to the shores of Kerry and Connemara, which plants are not to be found in England, even in Cornwall, which one would have thought must surely have arrested them first ? Why, when neither the common toad or frog are indigenous in Ireland (for the latter, though common enough now, was only introduced at the beginning of last century) a comparatively rare little toad, the Natterjack, should be found in one corner of Kerry to all appearances indigenously? All these questions, however, belong to quite another sort of book, and to a much larger survey of the field than there is time here to embark upon, so there is nothing for it but to turn one's back resolutely upon the tempting sin of discursiveness, or we shall find our- selves belated before our real journey is even begun. The first people, then, of whose existence in Ireland we can be said to know anything are commonly asserted to have been of Turanian origin, and are known as "Formorians," As far as we can gather, they were a dark, low-browed, stunted race, although, ^J 6 PRIMEVAL IRELAND. oddly enough, the word Formorian in early Irish legend is always used as synonymous with the word giant. They were, at any rate, a race of utterly savage hunters and fishermen, ignorant of metal, of pottery, possibly even of the use of fire ; using the stone hammers or hatchets of which vast numbers remain in Ireland to this day, and specimens of which may be seen in every museum. How long they held possession no one can tell, although Irish philologists believe several local Irish names to date from this almost inconceivably remote epoch. Perhaps if we think of the Lapps of the present day, and picture them wandering about the country, catching the hares and rabbits in nooses, burrowing in the earth or amongst rocks, and being, not impossibly, looked down on with scorn by the great Irish elk which still stalked majestically over the hills ; rearing ugly little altars to dim, formless gods ; trembling at every sudden gust, and seeing demon faces in every bush and brake, it will give us a fairly good notion of what these very earliest inhabitants of Ireland were probably like. Next followed a Belgic colony, known as the Firbolgs, who overran the country, and appear to have been of a somewhat higher ethnological grade, although, like the Formorians, short, dark, and swarthy. Doubtless the latter were not entirely exterminated to make way for the Firbolgs, any more than the Firbolgs to make way for the Danaans, Milesians, and other successive races ; such wholesale exter- minations being, in fact> very rare, especially in a country which like Ireland seems specially laid out THE FIRBOLGS. - 7 by kindly nature for the protection of a weaker race struggling in the grip of a stronger one. After the Firbolgs, though I should be sorry to be obliged to say how long after, fresh and more important tribes of invaders began to appear. The first of these were the Tuatha-da-Danaans, who arrived under the leadership of their king Nuad, and took possession of the east of the country. These Tuatha-da-Danaans are believed to have been large, blue-eyed people of Scandinavian origin, kinsmen and possibly ancestors of those Norsemen or " Danes " who in years to come were destined to work such woe and havoc upon the island. Many battles took place between these Danaans and the earlier Firbolgic settlers —the native owners as no doubt they felt themselves of the country. One of the best substantiated of these, not, indeed, by history or even tradition, but by a more solid testimony, that of the stone remains left on the spot, prove, at any rate, that so^/^e long- sustained battle was at some remote period fought on the spot. This is the famous pre-historic battle of Moytura, rather the Southern Moytura, for there were two ; the other, situated not far from the present town of Sligo, retaining " the largest collection of pre-historic remains," says Dr. Petrie, " in any region in the world with the exception of Carnac." This second battle of Moytura was fought upon the plain of Cong, which is washed by the waters of Lough Mask and Lough Corrib, close to where the long monotonous midland plain of Ireland becomes broken, changes into that region of high mountains and low-lying valleys, now 8 PRIMEVAL IRELAND. called Connemara, but which In earlier days was always known as lar Connaught. It is a wild scene even now, not very much less so than it must have been when this old and half- mythical Battle of the West was fought and won. A grey plain, " stone-roughened like the graveyard of dead hosts," broken into grassy ridges, and starred at intervals with pools, repeating the larger glitter of the lake hard by. Over the whole surface of this tumbled plain rise, at intervals, great masses of rock, some natural, but others artificially up-tilted — crom- lechs and dolmens, menhirs and cairns — whitened by lichen scrawls, giving them often in uncertain light the effect of so many undecipherable inscriptions, written in a long-forgotten tongue. From the position of the battle-field it has been made out to their own satisfaction by those who have studied it on the spot, that the Firbolgs must have taken up a fortified position upon the hill called Ben- levi ; a good strategic position unquestionably, having behind it the whole of the Mayo mountains into which to retreat in case of defeat. The Danaans, on the other hand, advancing from the plains of Meath, took up their station upon the hill known as Knockmaa,': standing by itself about five miles from the present town of Tuam, on the top of which stands a great cairn, believed to have been in existence even then — a legacy of some yet earlier and more primitive race which inhabited the country, and, therefore, possibly the oldest record of humanity to-day extant in Ireland. Three days the battle is said to have raged with ' Mow Castle Racket Hill. BATTLE OF MOYTURA. g varying fortunes, in the course of which the Danaan king Nuad lost his arm, a loss which was repaired, we are told, by the famous artificer Credue or Cerd, who made him a silver one, and as " Nuad of the Silver Hand " he figures conspicuously in early Irish history. In spite of this, and of the death of a number of their fighting-men, the stars fought for the Tuatha-da- Danaans, who were strong men and cunning, workers in metal, and great fighters, so that at last they utterly made an end of their antagonists, occupying the whole country, and holding it, say the annalists for a hundred and ninety and six years — building earth and stone forts, many of which exist to this day, but what their end was no man can tell you, save that they, too, were, in their turn, conquered by the Milesians or "Scoti,"who next overran the country, giving to it their own name of Scotia, by which name it was known down to the end of the twelfth century, and driving the earlier settlers before them, who there- upon fled to the hills, and took refuge in the forests, whence they emerged, doubtless, with unpleasant effect upon their conquerors, as another defeated race did upon t/ieir conquerors in later days. As regards the early doings of these Scoti, although nearer to us in point of time, their history is, if any- thing, rather more vague than that of their prede- cessors. The source for the greater part of it is in a work known as the " Annals of the Four Masters," a compilation put together in the sixteenth century, from documents now no longer existing, and which must unfortunately, be regarded as largely fictitious. Were names, indeed, all that were wanting to give substan- rO PRIMEVAL IRELAND. tiality there are enough and to spare, the beginning of every Irish history positively bristling with them. Leland, for instance, who published his three sturdy tomes in the year 1773, and who is still one of our chief authorities on the subject, speaks of Ireland as having " engendered one hundred and seventy one monarchs, all of the same house and lineage ; with sixty-eight kings, and two queens of Great Brittain and Ireland all sprung equally from her loins." We read in his pages of the famous brethren Heber and Heremon, sons of Milesius, who divided the island between them ; of Allamh Fodla, celebrated as a healer of feuds and protector of learning, who drew the priests and bards together into a triennial assembly at Tara, in Meath ; of Kimbaoth, who is praised by the annalists for having advanced learning and kept the peace. The times of peace had not ab- solutely arrived however, for he was not long after murdered, and wild confusion and wholesale slaughter ensued. Another Milesian prince, Thuathal, shortly afterwards returned from North Britain, and, assisted by a body of Pictish soldiers, defeated the rebels, restored order, and re-established the seat of his monarchy in Meath. As a specimen of the sort of stories current in history of this kind, Leland relates at considerable length the account of the insult offered to this Thuathal by the provincial king of Leinster. " The king," he tells us, " had married the daughter of Thuathal, but conceiving a violent passion for her sister, pretended that his wife had died, and demanded and obtained her sister in marriage. The two ladies met in the MYTHS. II royal house of Leinster. Astonishment and sorrow put an end to their lives ! " The offender not long afterwards was invaded by his justly indignant father-in-law, and his province only preserved from desolation on condition of paying a heavy tribute, " as a perpetual memorial of the resentment of Thuathal and of the offence committed by the king of Leinster." Another special favourite of the annalists is Cormac O'Conn, whose reign they place about the year 250, and over whose doings they wax eloquent, dwell- ing upon the splendour of his court, the heroism of his warlike sons, the beauty of his ten fair daughters, the doings of his famous militia, the Fenni or Fenians, and especially of his illustrious general Finn, or Fingal, the hero of the legends, and father of the poet Ossian — a warrior whom we shall meet with again in the next chapter. And now, it will perhaps be asked, what is one in sober seriousness to say to all this .-* All that one can say is that these tales are not to be taken as history in any rigid sense of the word, but must for the most part be regarded as mere hints, caught from chaos, and coming down through a hundred broken mediums ; scraps of adventures told around camp fires ; oral traditions; rude songs handed from father to son, and altering more or less with each new teller. The early history of Ireland is in this respect much like the early history of all other countries. We have the same semi-mythical aggregations, grown up around some small kernel of reality, but so changed, swollen, distorted, that it is difficult to distinguish the true 12 PRIMEVAL IRELAND. from the false ; becoming vaguer and vaguer too as the mists of time and sentiment gather more and more thickly around them, until at last we seem to be swimming dimly in a " moony vapour," which allows no dull peaks of reality to pierce through it at all. "There were giants in those days," is a continually recurring assertion, characteristic of all ancient annals, and of these with the rest. CROMLECH ON HOWTH. 11. THE LEGENDS AND THE LEGEND MAKERS. Better far than such historic shams — cardboard castles with little or no substance behind them — are the real legends. These put forward no obtrusive preten- sions to accuracy, and for that very reason are far truer in that larger sense in which all the genuine and spontaneous outgrowth of a country form part and parcel of its history. Some of the best of these have been excellently translated by Mr. Joyce, whose "Celtic Romances" ought to be in the hands of every one, from the boy of twelve upwards, who aspires to know anything of the inner history of Ireland ; to understand, that is to say, that curiously recurrent note of poetry and pathos which breaks continually through all the dull hard prose of the surface. A note often lost in unmitigated din and discord, yet none the less re-emerging, age after age, and century after century, and always when it does so lending its own charm to a record, which, without some such alleviations, would be almost too grim and disheartening in its unrelieved and unresulting misery to be voluntarily approached at all. Although as they now stand none appear to be of 14 THE LEGENDS AND THE LEGEND MAKERS. earlier date than the ninth or tenth century, these stories all breathe the very breath of a primitive world. An air of remote pagan antiquity hangs over them, and as we read we seem gradually to realize an Ireland as unlike the one we know now as if, like the magic island of Buz, it had sunk under the waves and been lost. Take, for instance — for space will not allow of more than a sample — the story of " The Pursuit of Gilla Backer and his Horse," not by any means one of the best, yet characteristic enough. In it we learn that from Beltane, the ist of May — the great Celtic festival of the sun — to Sanim, the ist of November, the chiefs and Fenni hunted each day with their hounds through the forests and over the plains, while from Sanim to Beltane they lived in the " Betas," or houses of hospitality, or feasted high with Finn McCumal, son of Cumal, grandson of Trenmore O'Baskin, whose palace stood upon the summit of the hill of Allen, a hill now crowned with a meaningless modern obelisk, covering the site of the old historic rath, a familiar object to thousands who have looked jup at it from the Curragh of Kildare, certainly with no thought in their minds of Finn McCumal or his vanished warriors. The tale tells how one day, after hunting on the Plains of Cliach, the Fenni sat down to rest upon the hill of Colkilla, their hunting tents being pitched upon a level spot near the summit. How presently, afar off over the plain at their feet, they saw one of the con- quered race of earlier inhabitants, a " Formorian " of huge size and repulsive ugliness coming towards them, leading his horse by the halter, an animal larger, it THE STORY OF THE GILL A D ACKER. 15 seems, than six ordinary horses, but broken down and knock-kneed, with jaws that stuck out far in advance of its head. How the heroes, idling pleasantly about in the sunshine, laughed aloud at the uncouth "foreigner " and his ugly raw-boned beast, " covered with tangled scraggy hair of a sooty black." How he came before the king and, having made obeisance, told him that his name was the Gilla Backer, and then and there took service with him for a year, desiring at the same time that special care should be paid to his horse, and the best food given it, and care taken that it did not stray, whereat the heroes laughed again, the horse standing like a thing carved in wood and unable apparently to move a leg. No sooner, however, was it loosed, and the halter cast off, than it rushed amongst the other horses, kicking and lashing, and seizing them with its teeth till not one escaped. Seeing which, the Fenni rose up in high wrath, and one of them seized the Gilla Backer's horse by the halter and tried to draw it away, but again it became like a rock, and refused to stir. Then he mounted its back and flogged it, but still it remained like a stone. Then, one after the other, thirteen more of the heroes mounted, but still it stirred not. The ver>' instant, however, that its master, the Gilla Backer rose up angrily to depart, the old horse went too, with the fourteen heroes still upon his back, whereat the Fenni raised fresh shouts of laughter. But the Gilla Backer, after he had walked a little way, looked back, and seeing that his horse was following, stood for a moment to tuck up his skirts. " Then, all at once changing his 1 6 THE LEGENDS AND THE LEGEND MAKERS. pace, he set out with long strides ; and if you know what the speed of a swallow is, flying across a mountain-side, or the fairy wind of a March day sweeping over the plains, then you can understand Gilla Backer, as he ran down the hillside towards the south-west. Neither was the horse behindhand in the race, for, though he carried a heavy load, he galloped like the wind after his master, plunging and bounding forward with as much freedom as if he had nothing at all on his back." Finn and his warriors left behind on the hill stared awhile, and then resolved to go to Ben Edar, now Howth, there to seek for a ship to follow after Gilla Backer and his horse, and the fourteen heroes. And on their way they met two bright-faced youths wearing mantles of scarlet silk, fastened by brooches of gold, who, saluting the king, told him their names were Foltlebar and Feradach, and that they were the sons of the king of Innia, and each possessed an art, and that as they walked they had disputed whose art was the greater. " And my art," said Feradach, " is this. If at any time a company of warriors need a ship, give me only my joiner's axe and my crann-tavall,^ and I am able to provide a ship without delay. The only thing I ask them to do is this — to cover their heads close and keep them covered, while I give the crann-tavall three blows of my axe. Then I tell them to uncover their heads, and lo, there lies the ship in harbour, ready to sail ! " The Foltlebar spoke and said, " This, O king, is the art I profess : On land I can track the wild duck over ' A sling for projeciing stones, strung rather like a cross-bow. THE STORY OF THE GILLA BACKER. tj nine ridges and nine glens, and follow her without being once thrown out, till I drop upon her in her nest. And I can follow up a track on sea quite as well as on land, if I have a good ship and crew." And Finn replied, " You are the very men I want ; and now I take you both into my service. Though our own trackmen, the Clan Naim, are good, yet we now need some one still more skilful to follow the Gilla Backer through unknown seas." To these unknown seas they went, starting from Ben Edar, and sailed away west for many days over the Atlantic, seeing many strange sights and passing many unknown islands. But at last the ship stopped short in front of an island with vast rocky cliffs towering high above their heads as steep as a sheet of glass, at which the heroes gazed amazed and baffled, not knowing what to do next. But Dermot O'Dynor — called also Dermot of the Bright-face — undertook to climb it, for of all the Fenni he was the most learned in Druidical enchantments, having been early taught the secret of fairy lore by Mananan Mac Lir, who ruled over the Inis Manan or Land of Promise. Dermot accordingly took leave of his friends and climbed the great cliff, and when he reached the top he found that it was flat and covered with tall green grass, as is often the case in these desolate wind- blown Atlantic islets. And in the very centre he found a well with a tall pillar stone beside it, and beside the pillar stone a drinking-horn chased with gold. And he took up the drinking-horn to drink, being thirsty, but the instant he touched the brim with his lips, lo ! a great Wizard Champion armed 1 8 THE LEGENDS AND THE LEGEND MAKERS. to the teeth, sprang up out of the earth, whereupon he and Dermot O'Dynor fought together beside the well the livelong day until the dusk fell. But the moment the dusk fell, the wizard champion sprang with a great bound into the middle of the well, and so disappeared, leaving Dermot standing there much astonished at what had befallen him. And the next day the same thing happened, and the next, and the next. But on the fourth day, Dermot watched his foe narrowly, and when the dusk came on, and he saw that he was about to spring into the well, he flung his arms tightly about him, and the wizard champion struggled to get free, but Dermot held him, and at length they both fell together into the well, deeper and deeper to the very bottom of the earth, and there was nothing to be seen but dim shadows, and nothing to be heard but vague confused sounds like the roaring of waves. At length there came a glimmering of light, and all at once bright day broke suddenly around them, and they came out at the other side of the earth, and found themselves in Tir-fa-ton, the land under the sea, where the flowers bloom all the year round, and no man has ever so much as heard the word Death. What happened there ; how Dermot O'Dynor met the other heroes, and how the fourteen Fenni who had been carried off were at last recaptured, would be too long to tell. Unlike most of these legends all comes right in the end ; Gilla Dacker and his ugly horse disappear suddenly into space, and neither Finn himself nor any of his warriors ever see them again. THE BARDS. I9 It is impossible, I think, to read this, and to an even greater degree some of the other stories, which have been translated by Mr. Joyce and others, without per- ceiving how thoroughly impregnated with old-world and mythological sentiment they are. An air of all but fabulous antiquity pervades them, greater perhaps than pervades the legends of any other north Euro- pean people. We seem transplanted to a world of the most primitive type conceivable ; a world of myth and of fable, of direct Nature interpretations, of mythology, in short, pure and simple. Even those stories which are known to be of later origin exhibit to a greater or less degree the same character ; one which has come down to them doubtless from earlier half-forgotten tales, of which they are merely the final and most modern outcome. When, too, we turn from the legends themselves to the legend-makers, everything that we know of the position of the bards {OllaniJis or Sennacliies) carries out the same idea. In the earliest times they were not merely the singers and story-tellers of their race, but to a great degree they bore a religious or semi- religious character. Like the Brehons or judges they were the directors and guides of the others, but they possessed in addition a peculiarly Druidical character of sanctity, as the inheritors and interpreters of a revelation confided to them alone. A power the more formidable because no one, probably, had ever ventured to define its exact character. The Head bard or Ollamh, in the estimation of his tribesmen, stood next in importance to the chieftain or king — higher, indeed, in some respects ; for whereas 20 THE LEGENDS AND THE LEGEND MAKERS. to slay a king might, or might not be criminal, to slay an Ollamh entailed both outlawing in this life and a vaguer, but not the less terrible, supernatural penalty in another. Occasionally, as in the case of the Ollamh Fodhla, by whom the halls of Tara are reputed to have been built, the king was himself the bard, and so combined both offices, but this appears to have been rare. Even as late as the sixteenth century, refusal of praise from a bard was held to confer a far deeper and more abiding stigma upon a man than blame from any other lips. If they, " the bards," says an Eliza- bethan writer, " say ought in dispraise, the gentleman, especially the meere Irish, stand in great awe." It is easy, I think, to see this is merely the sur- vival of some far more potent power wielded in earlier times. In pre-Christian days especially, the penalty attaching to the curse of a Bard was understood to carry with it a sort of natural anathema, not unlike the priestly anathema of later times. Indeed there was one singular, and, as far as -I am aware, unique power possessed by the Irish Bards, which goes beyond any priestly or papal anathema, and which was known as the Clann Dichin, a truly awful malediction, by means of which the Ollamh, if offended or injured, could pronounce a spell against, the very land of his injurer ; which spell once pronounced that land would produce no crop of any kind, neither could living creature graze upon it, neither was it possible even to walk over it without peril, and so it continued until the wrong, whatever it was, had been repented, and the curse of the Ollamh was lifted off from the land acrain. THE CLANN DICHIN. 21 Is it to be wondered at that men, endowed with such powers of blessing or banning, possessed of such mystic communion with the then utterly unknown powers of nature, should have exercised an all but unlimited influence over the minds of their countrymen, especially at a time when the powers of evil were still supposed to stalk the earth in all their native malignity, and no light of any revelation had broken through the thick dim roof overhead ? Few races of which the world has ever heard are as imaginative as that of the Celt, and at this time the imagination of every Celt must have been largely exercised in the direction of the malevolent and the terrible. Even now, after fourteen hundred years of Christianity, the Connaught or Kerry peasant still hears the shriek of his early gods in the sob of the waves or the howling of the autumn storms. Fish demons gleam out of the sides of the mountains, and the black bog-holes are the haunts of slimy monsters of inconceivable horror. Even the less directly baneful spirits such as Finvarragh, king of the fairies, who haunts the stony slopes of Knockmaa, and all the endless variety of dil niinores, the cluricans, banshees, fetches who peopled the primitive forests, and still hop and mow about their ruined homes, were far more likely to injure than to benefit unless approached in exactly the right manner, and with the properly uttered conjurations. The Unknown is always the Terrible; and the more vivid an untaught imagination is, the more certain it is to conjure up exactly the things which alarm it most, and which it least likes to have to believe in. Ill PRE-CHRISTIAN IRELAND. Getting out of this earliest and foggiest period, whose only memorials are the stones which still cumber the ground, or those subtler traces of occupation of which philology keeps the key,and pushing aside a long and uncounted crowd of kings, with names as uncertain as their deeds, pushing aside, too, the legends and coming to hard fact, we must picture Ireland still covered for the most part with pathless forests, but here and there cleared and settled after a rude fashion by rough cattle-owning tribes, who herded their own cattle and " lifted " their neighbour's quite in the approved fashion of the Scotch Highlanders up to a century and a half ago. Upon the whole, we may fairly conclude that matters were ameliorating more or less ; that the wolves were being killed, the woods cleared — not as yet in the ferocious wholesale fashion of later days — that a little rudimentary agriculture showed perhaps here and there in sheltered places. Sheep and goats grazed then as now over the hills, and herds of cattle began to cover the Lowlands. The men, too, were possibly beginning to grow a trifle less like two-legged beasts of prey, SLAVERY. 23 though Still rough as the very wolves they hunted ; bare-legged, wild-eyed hunter-herdsmen with — who can doubt it ? — flocks of children trooping vociferously at their heels. Of the daily life, habits, dress, religion of these people — the direct ancestors of four-fifths of the pre- sent inhabitants of Ireland — we know unfortunately exceedingly little. It is not even certain, whether human sacrifices did or did not form — as they certainly did in Celtic Britain — part of that religion, though there is some evidence that it did, in which case prisoners taken in battle, or slaves, were probably the victims. That a considerable amount of slavery existed in early Celtic Ireland is certain, though as to the rules by which it was regulated, as of almost every other detail of the life, we know little or nothing. At the time of the Anglo-Norman conquest Ireland was said to be full of English slaves carried off in raids along the coast, and these filibustering expedi- tions undoubtedly began in very early times. St. Patrick himself was thus carried off, and the annalists tell us that in the third century Cormac Mac Art ravaged the whole western coast of Britain, and brought away " great stores of slaves and treasures." To how late a period, too, the earlier conquered races of Ireland, such as the Formorians, continued as a distinct race from their Milesian conquerors, and whether they existed as a slave class, or, as seems more probable, as mere outcasts and vagabonds out of the pale of humanity, liable like the " Tory " of many centuries later, to be killed whenever caught ; all these 24 PRE-CHRISTIAN IRELAND. are matters on which we have unfortunately only the vaguest hints to guide us. The whole texture of society must have been loose and irregular to a degree that it is difficult for us now to conceive, without central organization or social cement of any kind. In one respect — that of the treatment of his women — the Irish Celt seems to have always stood in favourable contrast to most of the other rude races which then covered the north of Europe, but as regards the rest there was probably little difference. Fighting was the one aim of life. Not to have washed his spear in an adversary's gore, was a reproach which would have been felt by a full- grown tribesman to have carried with it the deepest and most lasting ignominy. The very women were not in early times exempt from war service, nay, probably would have scorned to be so. They fought beside their husbands, and slew or got slain with as reckless a courage as the men, and it was not until the time of St. Columba, late in the sixth century, that a law was passed ordering them to remain in their homes — a fact which alone speaks volumes both for the vigour and the undying pugnacity of the race. While, on the one hand, we can hardly thus exaggerate the rudeness of this life, we must be careful, on the other, of concluding that these people were simple barbarians, incapable of discriminating right from wrong. Men, even the wildest, rarely indeed live entirely without some law to guide them, and certainly it was so in Ireland. A rule was growing up and becoming theoretically at any rate, established, many of the provisions of which startle us by the ANCIENT IRISH LAW. 2$ curious modernness of their tone, so oddly do they contrast with what we know of the condition of civi- lization or non-civilization then existing. Although this ancient Irish law was not drawn up until long after the introduction of Christianity, it seems best to speak of it here, as, though modified by the stricter Christian rule, it in the main depended for such authority as it possessed upon traditions existing long before ; traditions regarded indeed by Celtic scholars as tracing their origin beyond the arrival of the first Celt in Ireland, outcomes and sur- vivals, that is to say, of yet earlier Aryan rule, showing points of resemblance with the equally Aryan laws of India, a matter of great interest, carrying our thoughts back along the history of humanity to a time when those differences which seem now the most inherent and vital were as yet undreamt of, and not one of the great nations of the modern world were as much as born. The two chief books in which this law is contained, the "Book of Aicill" and the " Senchus-Mor," have only comparatively recently been translated and made available for English readers. The law as there laid down was drawn up and administered by the Brehons, who were the judges and the law-makers of the people, and whose decision was appealed to in all matters of dispute. The most serious flaw of the system — a very serious one it will be seen — was that, owing to the scattered and tribal existence prevailing, there was no strong central rule beJiind the Brehon, as there is behind the modern judge, ready and able to enforce his decrees. At bottom, force, 26 PRE-CHRISTTAN IRELAND. it must not be forgotten, is the sanction of all law, and there was no available force of any kind then, nor for many a long day afterwards, in Ireland. I It was, no doubt, owing chiefly to this defective weakness that a system of fines rather than punish- ments grew up, one which in later times caused much scandal to English legal writers. In such a society crime in fact was hardly recognizable except in the form of an injury inflicted upon some person or persons. An offence against the State there could not be, simply be- cause there was no State to be offended. Everything, from murder down to the smallest and most acciden- ^tal injury, was compensated for by " erics " or fines. The amount of these fines was decided upon by the Brehon, who kept an extraordinary number of ima- ginary rulings, descending into the most minute par- ticulars, such as what fine was to be paid in the case of one person's cat stealing milk from another person's house, what fine in the case of one woman's bees stinging another woman, a careful distinction being preserved in this case between the case in which the sting did or did not draw blood ! Even in the matter of fines it does not seem clear how the penalty was to be enforced where the person on whom it was inflicted refused to submit and where there was no one at hand to coerce him successfully. As regards ownership of land early Irish law is very peculiar, and requires to be carefully studied. Primogeniture, regarded by all English lawyers trained under the feudal system as the very basis of inheri- tance, was simply unknown. Even in the case of the chieftain his rights belonged only to himself, and ANCIENT IRISH LAW. 27 before his death a re-election took place, when some other of the same blood, not necessarily his eldest son, or even his son at all, but a brother, first cousin, uncle, or whoever stood highest in the estimation of the clan, was nominated as " Tanist " or successor, and received promises of support from the rest. Elizabethan writers mention a stone which was placed upon a hill or mound having the shape of a foot cut on it, supposed to be that of the first chief or ancestor of the race, " upon which stone the Tanist placing his foot, took oath to maintain all ancient customs inviolably, and to give up the succession peaceably to his Tanist in due time." The object of securing a Tanist during the lifetime of the chief was to hinder its falling to a minor, or some one unfit to take up the chieftainship, and this continued to prevail for centuries after the Anglo- Norman invasion, and was even adopted by many owners of English descent who had become " meere Irish," as the phrase ran, or " degenerate English." "The childe being oftentimes left in nonage," says Campion, " could never defend his patrimony, but by the time he grow to a competent age and have buried an uncle or two, he also taketh his turn," a custom which, as he adds, " breedeth among them continual warres." The entire land belonged to the clan, and was held theoretically in common, and a redistribution made on the death of each owner, though it seems doubtful whether so very inconvenient an arrange- ment could practically have been adhered to. All sons, illegitimate as well as legitimate, shared and 28 PRE-CHRISTIAN IRELAND. shared alike, holding the property between them in undivided ownership. It was less the actual land than the amount of grazing it afforded which con- stituted its value. Even to this day a man, especially in the West of Ireland, will tell you that he has "the grass of three cows," or " the grass of six cows," as the case may be. It is curious that the most distinct ancient rules concerning the excessive extortion of rent are, as has been shown by Sir Henry Maine, to be found in the " Senchus Mor." Under its regulations three rents are enumerated — namely, the rack rent to be extorted from one of a strange tribe ; the fair rent from one of the same tribe ; and the stipulated rent to be paid equally to either. The Irish clan or sept was a very loose, and in many cases irregular, structure, embracing even those who were practically undistinguishable from slaves, yet from none of these could any but 2ifair or customary rent be demanded. It was only when those who by no fiction could be supposed to belong to the clan sought for land that the best price attainable might be extorted and insisted upon. In so primitive a state of society such persons were almost sure to be outcasts, thrown upon the world either by the breaking up of other clans or by their own misdoings. A man of this class was generally what was known as a " Fuidhar " or " broken man," and answered in some respects to the slave or the serf of the early English village community. Like him he seems to have been his lord's or chief's chattel, and if killed or injured the fine or "eric" was paid THE FAMILY. 29 not to his own family, but to his master. Such men were usually settled by the chief upon the unap- propriated tribal lands over which his own authority tended to increase. This Fuidhar class from the first seem to have been very numerous, and de- pending as they did absolutely upon the chief, there grew up by degrees that class of armed retainers — kerns and galloglasses, they were called in later times — who surrounded every important chief, whether of English or Irish descent, and were by them quar- tered forcibly in war time upon others, and so there grew up that system of " coyne and livery," or forced entertainment for horse and men, which is to be met with again and again throughout Irish history, and which undoubtedly was one of the greatest curses of the country, tending more perhaps than any other single cause to keep its people at the lowest possible condition of starvation and misery. ■^ No system of representation seems ever to have prevailed in Ireland. That idea is, in fact, almost purely Teutonic, and seems never to have sprung up spontaneously amongst any Celtic people. The family v/as the real root. Every head of a family ruled his own household, and submitted in his turn to the rule of his chief Blood-relationship, including fosterage, was the only real and binding union ; that larger con- nection known as the clan or sept, having the smaller one of the family for its basis, as was the case also amongst the clans of the Scotch highlands. Theo- retically, all members of a clan, high and low alike, were held to be the descendants of a common ancestor, and in this way to have a real and direct claim upon 36 PRE-CHRISTIAN IRELAND. one another. If a man was not in some degree akin to another he was no better than a beast, and might be killed like one without compunction whenever occasion arose. Everything thus began and centred around the tribe or sept. The whole theory of life was purely local. The bare right of existence extended only a {qw miles from your own door, to the men who bore the same name as yourself. Beyond that nothing was sacred ; neither age nor sex, neither life nor goods, not even in later times the churches themselves. Like his cousin of the Scotch Highlands, the Irish tribesman's life was one perpetual carnival of fighting, burning, raiding, plundering, and he who plundered oftenest was the finest hero. All this must be steadily borne in mind as it enables us to understand, as nothing else will, that almost insane joy in and lust for fighting, that marked inability to settle down to orderly life which runs through all Irish history from the beginning almost to the very end. Patriotism, too, it must be remembered, is in the first instance only an idea, and the narrowest of local jealousies may be, and often are, forms merely of the same impulse. To men living in one of these small isolated communities, each under the rule of its own petty chieftain, it was natural and perhaps inevitable that the sense of connection with those outside their own community should have been remarkably slight, and of nationality, as we understand the word, quite non-existent. Their own little circle of hills and valleys, their own forests and pasturage was their TRIBAL LIFE. 31 world, the only one practically of which they had any cognizance. To its scattered inhabitants of that day little Ireland must have seemed a region of incalculable extent, filled with enemies to kill or to be killed by ; a region in which a man might wander from sunrise to sunset yet never reach the end, nay, for days together without coming to a second sea. As Greece to a Greek of one of its smaller states it seemed vast simply because he had never in his own person explored its limits. MOUTH OF SEPULCHRAL CHAMBER AT DOWTH, NEW GRANGE. IV. ST. PATRICK THE MISSIONARY. But a new element was about to appear upon the troubled stage, and a new figure, one whose doings, however liberally we may discount the more purely supernatural part of them, strikes us even now as little short of miraculous. There are plenty of heathen countries still ; plenty of missionaries too ; but a missionary at whose word an entire island — a heathen country given up, it must be remembered, to exceedingly heathen practices — resigns its own creed, and that missionary, too, no king, no warrior, but a mere unarmed stranger, without power to enforce one of the decrees he proclaimed so authoritatively, is a phenomenon which we should find some little difficulty now, or, indeed, at any time, in paralleling. In one respect St. Patrick was less fortunate than his equally illustrious successor, Columba, since he found no contemporary, or nearly contemporary chronicler, to write his story ; the consequence being that it has become so overgrown with pious myths, so tangled and matted with portents and miracles, that it is often difficult for us to see any real substance or outline below them at all. HIS EARLY LIFE. 33 What little direct knowledge we have is derived from a famous Irish manuscript known as "The Book of Armagh," which contains, amongst other things, a Confession and an Epistle, believed by some authori- ties to have been actually written by St. Patrick him- self, which was copied as it now stands by a monkish scribe early in the eighth century. It also contains a life of the saint from which the accounts of his later historians have been chiefly drawn. According to the account now generally accepted he was born about the year 390, tliough as this would make him well over a hundred at the time of his death, perhaps 400 would be the safest date ; was a native, not as formerly believed of Gaul, but of Dum- barton upon the Clyde, whence he got carried off to Ireland in a filibustering raid, became the slave of one Milcho, an inferior chieftain, and herded his master's sheep upon the Slemish mountains in Antrim. Seven or eight years later he escaped, got back to Britain, was ordainqd, afterwards went to Gaul, and, according to one account, to Italy. But the thought of the country of his captivity seems to have remained upon his mind and to have haunted his sleeping and waking thoughts. The unborn children of the pagan island seemed to stretch our their hands for help to him. At last the inward impulse grew too strong to be resisted, and accompanied by a few fol- lowers, he set foot first on the coast of Wicklow where another missionary, Paladius, had before attempted vainly to land, and being badly received there, took boat again, and landed finally at the entrance of Strangford Lough. 34 ST. PATRICK THE MISSIONARY. From this point he made his way on foot to Meath, where the king Laoghaire was holding a pagan festival, and stopped to keep Easter on the hill of Slane where he lit a fire. This fire being seen from the hill of Tara aroused great anger, as no lights were by law allowed to be shown before the king's beacon was lit. Laoghaire accordingly sent to know the meaning of this in- solence and to have St. Patrick brought before him. St. Patrick's chronicler, Maccumacthenius (one could wish that he had been contented with a shorter name !), tells that as the saint drew nigh to Tara, many prodigies took place. The earth shook, darkness fell, and certain of the magicians who opposed him were seized and tossed into the air. One prodigy certainly took place, for he seems to have won converts from the first. A large number appear to have been gained upon the spot, and before long the greater part of Meath had accepted the new creed, although its king, Laoghaire himself remained a sturdy pagan until his death. From Tara St. Patrick went to Connaught, a province to v/hich he seems to have been drawn from the first, and there spent eight years, founding many churches and monasteries. There also he as- cended Croagh Patrick, the tall sugar-loaf mountain which stands over the waters of Clew Bay, and up to the summit of which hundreds of pilgrims still annually climb in his honour. From Connaught he next turned his steps to Ulster, visited Antrim and Armagh, and laid the foundations of the future cathedral and bishopric in the latter place. Wherever he went converts seem to have come THE NEW REVOLUTION. 35 in to him in crowds. Even the Bards, who had most to lose by the innovation, appear to have been in many cases drawn over. They and the chiefs gained, the rest followed unhesitatingly ; whole clans were baptized at a time. Never was spiritual conquest so astonishingly complete ! The tale of St. Patrick's doings ; of his many triumphs ; his few failures ; of the boy Benignus his first Irish disciple ; of his wrestling upon Mount Cruachan ; of King Eochaidh ; of the Bard Ossian, and his dialogues with the apostle, all this has been excellently rendered into verse by Mr. Aubrey de Vere, whose " Legends of St. Patrick " seem to the present writer by no means so well known as they ought to be. The second poem in the series, " The Disbeliet of Milcho," especially is one of great beauty, full of wild poetic gleams, and touches which breathe the very breath of an Irish landscape. Poetry is indeed the medium best suited for the Patrician history. The whole tale of the saint's achievements in Ireland is one of those in which history seems to lose its own sober colouring, to become luminous and half magical, to take on all the rosy hues of a myth. The best proof of the effect of the new reve- lation is to be found in that extraordinary burst of enthusiasm which marked the next few centuries. The passion for conversion, for missionary labour of all sorts, seems to have swept like a torrent over the island, arousing to its best and highest point that Celtic enthusiasm and which has never, unhap- pily, found such noble exercise since. Irish mis- sionaries flung themselves upon the dogged might 36 ST. PATRICK THE MISSIONARY. of heathenism, and grappled with it in a death struggle. Amongst the Picts of the Highlands, amongst the fierce Friscians of the Northern seas, beside the Lake of Constance, where the church ot St. Gall still preserves the name of another Irish saint, in the Black Forest, at Schaffhausen, at Wiirtzburg, through- out, in fact, all Germany and North Italy, they were ubiquitous. Wherever they went their own red-hot fervour seems to have melted every obstacle; wher- ever they went victory seems to have crowned their zeal.^ Discounting as much as j^ou choose everything that seems to partake of pious exaggeration, there can be no doubt that the period which followed the Christianizing of Ireland was one of those shining epochs of spiritual and also to a great degree intellec- tual enthusiasm rare indeed in the history of the world. Men's hearts, tull of newly -won fervour, burned to hand on the torch in their turn to others. They went out by thousands, and they beckoned in their converts by tens of thousands. Irish hospitality — a quality which has happily escaped the tooth of criticism — broke out then with a vengeance, and extended its hands to half a continent. From Gaul, from Britain, from Germany, from dozens of scattered places throughout the wide dominions of Charlemagne, the students came ; were kept, as Bede expressly tells us, free of cost in the Irish monasteries, and drew their first inspirations in the Irish schools. Even now, after the lapse of all these ' For an account of Irish missionaries in Germany, see Mr. Baring- rrould's " Germany," in this series, p. 46. CELTIC CHKISTIAXITV. 37 centuries, many of th'e places whence they came still reverberate faintly with the memory of that time. Before plunging into that weltering tangle of confusion which makes up what we call Irish history, one may be forgiven for lingering a little at this point, even at the risk of some slight over-balance of proportion. With so dark a road before us, it seems good to remember that the energies of Irishmen were not, as seems sometimes to be concluded, always and of necessity directed to injuring themselves or tor- menting their rulers ! Neither was this period by any means a short one. It was no mere " flash in the pan;" no " small pot soon hot " enthusiasm, but a steady flame which burned undimmed for centuries. " During the seventh and eighth centuries, and part of the ninth," says' Mr. Goldwin Smith, not certainly a prejudiced writer, " Ireland played a really great part in European history." " The new religious houses," says Mr. Green in his Short History," looked for their ecclesiastical traditions, not to Rome, but to Ireland, and quoted for their guidance the instructions not of Gregory, but of Columba." " For a time," he adds, " it seemed as if the course of the world's history was to be changed, as if that older Celtic race which the Roman and German had swept before them, had turned to the moral conquest of their con- querors, as if Celtic and not Latin Christianity was to mould the destinies of the Church of the West." V. THE FIRST IRISH MONASTERIES. At home during the same period the chief events were the founding of monasteries, and the settling down of monastic communities, every such monastery becoming the protector and teacher of the little Christian community in its vicinity, educating its own sons, and sending them out as a bee sends its swarms, to settle upon new ground, and to fertilize the flowers of distant harvest fields. At one time, " The Tribes of the Saints " seem to have increased to such an extent that they threa- tened to absorb all others. In West Ireland especially, little hermitages sprung up in companies of dozens and hundreds, all over the rock-strewn wastes, and along the sad shores of the Atlantic, dotting them- selves like sea gulls upon barren points of rock, or upon sandy wastes which would barely have sufficed, one might think, to feed a goat. We see their re- mains still — so tiny, yet so enduring — in the Isles of Arran ; upon a dozen rocky points all round the bleak edges of Connemara ; in the wild mountain glens of the Burren — set often with an admirable selection of site, in some sloping dell with, perhaps, H ■a b ^ O ^' > ss es -