The Yakima herald. [volume] (North Yakima, W.T. [Wash.]) 1889-1914, 1896-01-16
O'FARRELL THE HISTORIAN.

: The Hon. Pat O'Farrell poses in the
Oregonian, as historian. Listen ia
him. "Those of us who have grown gray
In the study and pursuit ..of historic and
economic truth are sneered at, etc. This
10 "deliscious." The wear and tear OF
Pats capillary tissue has not been alto
gether thrown away, as he seems to have
overtaken the truth of the silver question
but bis history Well il is, at least, his
own. He dismisses, in the calmest man.
ner. the statements OF the other leading
historians. He has a theory to advocate,
and opposing facts have to get out of bis
way.
He says, for instance, that "the Saxons
amalgamated with the latinized Britons, {"
that mo such thing as Anglo-Saxon civ
ilization ever had an existence" that
''the Anglo-Saxon race proper has long
since disappeared from the worlds stage"
There are hundreds OF facts equally
strange and startling, scattered like Irish
diamonds all over Pats ''discoorse," but
we have simply taken the first by way Of
sample.
1t has been held by hitherto accepted
authorities that the Saxon conquest of
Britain was the most complete and pitt
less known to history. Green, in his
history OF England. says that the Britons
were exterminated by the saxons, and
that the English conquest was a sheer
dispossession and slaughter OF the
Britons.
With an efrontry, Celtic in its naivete,
Pat ignores Cedmon, the Whitby Cow
herd, (Anglo-Saxon to the backbone) who
wrote the inspired epic, which to this day
is the accepted monument of Anglo
Saxon letters.
An authority whom even Pat Tin his
calmer moments) will acknowledge, says
everywhere "Caimon is type Of the new
grandeur, depth and feryor OF tone which
the German race was to give to the re-
ligion of the east"
Pat even quotes Bede himself to sup
port his contention against anglo Saxon
civilization, and Pat perpetrates the bull
in deadly earnest. As to the disappear
ance of the Anglo-Saxon race, we must
leave our great Irish historian 10 the
merciful judgment of everyone who
knows anything.
OF course it will have been guessed
that Pats whole object is to show that
the Irish civilized England. He says,
"To whatever standard Anglo-Saxon
language and civilization reached, 1t owed
it mainly to Ireland" Now, after deny
ing the civilization in toto, he here ad mits
it-unintentionslly of course. Irish,
quite Irish, you know. And consider
the weird construction OF that last sem
tence-the absence Of Anglo-Saxon civ
ilization from its language is absolute
and uncompromising.
Strange to say, Pat does not claim
Augustine as compatriot, an oversight
doubtless-also he quite forgets to men
mention Paulinus, in his claim that the
Irish christianized Northumbria. The
older historians aver that both the king
and the Witan OF Northumbria embraced
christianity under the ministrations Of
Paulinus. before the Irish monks began
to get their work in. TIE work OF these
and all honor to them for twas to
contend against the subsequent heather
reaction.
But why follow further Mr.. OFFS per-
feryidly imaginative history? His object
is the Qualification of the Irish Celt, and
of this We have had surfeit. The Irish
have enough good and bad in their record
without putting history on the rack to
furnish more.