The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1904-04-09

school and on sculpture; the language
in which Columkille prayed and Shane
O'Neill swore, the language of Tyr
relfs pass and Glenmalure, of Augh-
rim and of Aberlow, of Tough Corrib
and the Blackwater is rising again
from its grave in Ireland. Is it too
much to expect that the exile should
continue it over sea? If we have Ger
man. Slavonian, italian. Scandinavian
and Polish spoken in this country by
people who yet call themselves Ameri-
can citizens, why should not the Irish
language be spoken and perused as
we'll? The reason, to my mind, why
so close a bond exists between the vari-
GUS nationalities in this country is the
maintenance of their ancestral tongues;
why should Irishmen alone forfeit this
bond, a bond that would knit them to-
gether far more closely than any
friendly society or political organiza-
ton?
Finally, there is the newborn friend
Illness of England for Ireland. 1t is
widely said that King Edward means
very kindly towards his Irish subjects.
Perhaps his majesty feels with the
priest in the old Greek play that it is
a nobler thing to rule with men than
DER an empty land" Perhaps his Eng
lish eyes We're opened by the Boer
war, when the riff-raff of Irish towns
had to retrieve the reputation of the
scarlet jacket in South Africa. Per-
haps his royal ears heard the reply Of
band Of Beers to an English regiment
who shouted to them to come out from
behind their kopjes and see what stuff
they (the English) were made Of:
"Come out from behind the Irishmen
and you will see what stuff we are
made off,
This kindness of the king is re-
fiected. they say, in the attitude of sew
eral Of his high-placed officials. Sir
Mortimer Durand, the British ambassa-
dor at Washington, said recently at a
banquet in New York: England has
nothing but good will towards Ireland,
and the sentiment should be returned.
II not, we English are in bad way,
for his majesty's foreign affairs are in
the hands of an Irishman, another
commands the army, another the chan
mel fleet, and if all turned against
us :" (The rest of the sentence,
we read, was drowned in laughter and
applause.)
How does Ireland reciprocate this
newborn sentiment? A stranger to the
Emerald Isle would be puzzled for an
answer. 1 remember, when an Irish
regiment was embarking at Munster
port for South Africa, how the night
previous was spent in shouting for Paul
Kruger and in flinging it's acquire
ments into the river SUR. The officers
made no attempt to quell this apparent
mutiny, one of them sagely remarking
that it was John jameson far more
than Paul Kruger who was responsible
for this midnight treason. The next
morning the regiment was as steady
and as loyal on parade as if it had
never experienced the delicious feeling
of being "agin the government" Again,
Colonel Lynch was elected for Gal
way against a gentleman who is
doing great deal for industries
in Ireland, simply because the colonel
had fought against England in the
Boer war. Soon after King Edward
came to Galway. and from the ELUSIVE
reception he got one would say there
wasn't pro-Boer nearer to Galway
than kalamazoo A stranger who had
not dug deep into the history and the
heart of Ireland, who did not know
of the bedrock beneath the sands, might
well call this people volatile and tickle
-snarlers today and spaniels tomor-
row.
No matter what be the feeling of
England and Ireland, it is said by not
few that a people addicted to drink
and Jealousy can never rise to great
ness in their own land. Drunkenness
is not an essential feature of the Irish
character. 1t was only when the Eng
lisnman had depraved him with penal
laws, when he had made a Helot of
him, that the Irishman took to drink.
L have never heard or read that the
Irish previous to the surrender of Linn
erick ever lost a battle or great op-
portunity through alcohol. Convivial
of course they always were and are;
their measure Of hospitality is the
| cruiskeen Ian. Besides, it is not the
quantity of liquor he takes but the
attitude he then strikes that has ad-
vertised this alleged propensity. 1t is
frank, impulsive, unwary nature makes
him somewhat Thracian in his cups.
If Irishmen drink, it is Irishmen like
wise who are the backbone of every
temperance movement. What nation
in the world as nation ever took a
pledge and kept it? OF course the
flippant rejoinder might be what ma
ton ever needed a pledge so sorely :?
Even so, this public act, unique in the
annals Of temperance, reflects as much
credit upon the self-sacrifice of Ireland
as upon the zeal of TheObald Mathew.
must say, however, that this drink