The figure of Kathleen Ni Houlihan has appeared in several folk songs and poems. Ethna Carbery's "The Passing of the Gael" (1906), which was a sentimental treatment of the Irish diaspora during the 19th century (partly because of the Great Famine of that period), suggested that Irish emigrants longed for their homeland. Carbery refers to Kathleen Ni Houlihan by name as the personification of Ireland that the emigrants miss.