The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1889-03-09
mitchell at the fountain head, the re-
suit will we'll repay the trouble. To

my Judgement he was the greatest Irish
master OF the style that ever penned a
sentence-lucent as Lucifer, the morn
sive as aquaforti; strong
and crushing as steam roller, trench
ant as Carlyle, without his plaguev af-
Fiction Of double barred Teutonesque
neologlsms: glowing as Macualay
without his, in the end, meretrlc-
1ous monotonya of gauZe-treacle in
thick layers, fireworks where every
artiiice is All elaborated Catherine
wheel; plain and direct as Goblet, minus
the vulgarjty O. poet not needing the
aid nor tied by the trammels of verse;
painter who could create effects as
striking and permanent with his pen
and ink as others with brushes multi
piled and whole chrOmatic compost Of
pigments, top dressed by costliest of
copal.
He was very conscientious in compo.
sition Before he wrote on any subject,
even those Of such an ephemeral class
as formed the material of a bi-weekly
correspondence for New York jour
nal, he looked at it from every side,
thought it out, consulted authorities at
the Imperial Library and elsewhere. and
then sat down and invested it with an
originality and a subtlety lin the better
sensel all his own. tie had a holy
horror Of the facile stereotyped news
paperese. lie was no houlevardlc chro-
nicler, 10 snapper up Of uuconsidered
trlnes. To him press work Of the
Thibet praying machine order, rolling
out in amending uuvarying tape, must
have been utter drudgery. It Was put
ting mettled steed to tug at the weary
round Of a mill wheel. Bat it had to
he dcne for bread, and thus the talents
were spent, almoSt frittereu, On the
topics Of All hour> sTbich might, and
should, have been busy making precious
and enduring additions to literature.
Politics rayished him from the fond
beckonings of the Pierides. His tenn
peraulent was of such reckless energetic
fiber Chat enc cannot picture HIM re-
clining under shade Of Virgilian beech
or exc 4 australian blue gum tree, much
less contenting himself with the petit
fo4ging wraugles, the artificial excite
ments, and nice law-points of a country
attorney. He pailted for action, re-
ioiceI IN the shock and fame Of COM.
bat, longed to plunge into the mid
wl,lrl Of yeftiginous tunult, and feel
that ha was indeed living, and force.
That was the key TO his character. The
gain to Irish politics of Mitchel's asso-
ciation with it is IN the example OF ali
uucompromlsing love Of country and
fierce sincerity; but Oh the other hand
the loss Of Irish literature, because of it,
is incalculable. Still some Of bis books
remain rs lasting ana as solid testimo-
MES to his genius, such as 1.-The Last
Conquest OF Ireland (Peyhaps,)" The
Jail Journal and the peerless mono.
graph On Mangan, His continuation
OF the Able Macgeoghegan "History
OF Ireland" too, tia s'magnum opus"
Clear, vigorous, true, and compendious
without being skimping
1t was not amusing to lead in a re-
port Of a meeting of a literary society
in Dublin the other day that we have
not yet great historian, poet or novel.
ist. We lave the historian in Mitchell,
one as good as the theme is worth.
What would you Some people forget
that this is trial world, not world of
stAgnation; John a-dreams has no place
here,
Act act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'er head,'t
is the wise and healthy motto, the coun-
sci never out Of season. 1t is useless
to go moplng and meandeling with
droWsy reverence over the irrecuverable
past, Better that We should feel the
full blood Of the Now bounding in our
veins, and do something that posteritv
may prize. AS to the dictum anent the
poets ard novelisls, certain we have no
Shakespeare Or Scott, nor are we likely to
have until the English tongue has in
grained itself in us-a matter of gener-
ations. We have no epic or dramatic
poets OF the first rank, albeit there haye
been She'll and Sheridan Knowles over
much stilt and glltter-and the highest
of living dramatic poets in these realms
is an Irishman, Willis of Waterford
But we have lyric poets innumerable,
and we can boast Of novelists, and
great novelists. whose hold on the wide.
reading public shows no token of re-
laxing. I have been reading Lever
lately, and | withdraw anything [ have
said against him; he is splendid, unap-
proachable in his line, aud racily Irish
the whole Irish question is summed
up IN Father LOTUS brief address to
Jack Hinton in the 35th chapter Of that
roIlicking story, and then his shrewd,
spirited. sarcastic sketches of Irish
"genteel'' failings, and how the con-
tinental scbemers exploit them in ''The
Dodd Family Abroad''-but how can
Dryasdust De expected to appraise that?
Then are there not Loyer-the mimi
table Rory O'Moore'' is the best Irish
extant- Carleton, Banim and Griffin,
not TO speak Cf such mOdernS as Sheri-