Irish Street Ballads By Colm O'Lochlainn
Colm Ó Lochlainn on Irish Street Ballads
ΤΟ BEGIN WITH I MUST RECORD that since the introduction to IRISH STREET BALLADS was written in 1939 the pattern of life in Ireland bas changed. With the growth of radio and television more and more do people turn to mechanical entertainment.
One would think the ballad-singer should have vanished. But it is not so. Still on fair-green, market-square, race-course, burling and football pitches 'people of the itinerant class' (as the Justices call them) are found in full-throated song where the crowd is thickest.
The fame of Galway Race Week, of the October Horse-fair in Ballinasloe, of Puck Fair in Killorglin, bas spread around the world. Originally these annual roysterings attracted the locals only; but now they draw devotees from every province, from every country. From foreign parts they come in search of folk-lore. From America and Canada come second or third- generation Irish, striving to pick up the threads of ancestry, the notes of balladry.
ΤΟ BEGIN WITH I MUST RECORD that since the introduction to IRISH STREET BALLADS was written in 1939 the pattern of life in Ireland bas changed. With the growth of radio and television more and more do people turn to mechanical entertainment.
One would think the ballad-singer should have vanished. But it is not so. Still on fair-green, market-square, race-course, burling and football pitches 'people of the itinerant class' (as the Justices call them) are found in full-throated song where the crowd is thickest.
The fame of Galway Race Week, of the October Horse-fair in Ballinasloe, of Puck Fair in Killorglin, bas spread around the world. Originally these annual roysterings attracted the locals only; but now they draw devotees from every province, from every country. From foreign parts they come in search of folk-lore. From America and Canada come second or third- generation Irish, striving to pick up the threads of ancestry, the notes of balladry.
The ballad, an authentic reflex of the Irish spirit in Gaelic or in English, has come into its own. Organisa tions like An Óige (Irish Youth Hostels), Muintir na Tire (Land-folk), Irish Countrywomen, Macra na Feirme (Young Farmers) bave revived these country songs with enthusiasm. Hardly a night but some
Common Room, Club Hall or Public House resounds with ballads, most popular being those with a chorus. I bave known ballads in Irish and English sung and taken up with joy in Norway, Belgium, Holland, France and Germany at International Conferences. One might almost claim for the ballad a good share in building International Friendship.
A more recent, almost a spontaneous movement of our people has brought about the founding of Combaltas Ceoltóiri Éireann and the holding of a Fleadh Cedil, a Festival of Irish Music, in various provincial towns. Mullingar gave the lead in 1951 and there gathered all the traditional pipers, fiddlers, accordion players and singers for fifty miles around. None was high-brow or pretentious, all were welcome if only they had something to offer in Irish or Anglo-Irish music.
Soon the counties were viewing with one another. Monaghan, Westmeath (Athlone), Cavan, Galway (Lougbrea), Clare (Ennis), Waterford (Dungarvan), Longford, Tipperary (Thurles), Roscommon (Boyle), Mayo (Swinford), Wexford (Gorey). Mullingar in 1963 was a wonder, Monaghan (Clones) in 1964 and Thurles this Whitsuntide better still.
Formal competitions, concerts and recitals are held in the Town Hall; but informal gatherings happen in every hotel and licensed house. Every lane and alley resounds to the strains of traditional Irish music on fiddle, flute, tin whistle, Union pipes, and of course, the best instrument of all, the natural human voice. Ballads new and old, are sung with vigour, some to the fiddle, guitar or accordion, many 'just raw'.
Common Room, Club Hall or Public House resounds with ballads, most popular being those with a chorus. I bave known ballads in Irish and English sung and taken up with joy in Norway, Belgium, Holland, France and Germany at International Conferences. One might almost claim for the ballad a good share in building International Friendship.
A more recent, almost a spontaneous movement of our people has brought about the founding of Combaltas Ceoltóiri Éireann and the holding of a Fleadh Cedil, a Festival of Irish Music, in various provincial towns. Mullingar gave the lead in 1951 and there gathered all the traditional pipers, fiddlers, accordion players and singers for fifty miles around. None was high-brow or pretentious, all were welcome if only they had something to offer in Irish or Anglo-Irish music.
Soon the counties were viewing with one another. Monaghan, Westmeath (Athlone), Cavan, Galway (Lougbrea), Clare (Ennis), Waterford (Dungarvan), Longford, Tipperary (Thurles), Roscommon (Boyle), Mayo (Swinford), Wexford (Gorey). Mullingar in 1963 was a wonder, Monaghan (Clones) in 1964 and Thurles this Whitsuntide better still.
Formal competitions, concerts and recitals are held in the Town Hall; but informal gatherings happen in every hotel and licensed house. Every lane and alley resounds to the strains of traditional Irish music on fiddle, flute, tin whistle, Union pipes, and of course, the best instrument of all, the natural human voice. Ballads new and old, are sung with vigour, some to the fiddle, guitar or accordion, many 'just raw'.
So for a long week-end the whole countryside makes merry in a gay, light-hearted way such as Ireland bas not known for over a century. Gone are the silence and gloom which George Petrie noted with sorrow in 1855 after the 'Great Hunger' bad wasted the land.
A quarterly magazine Ceól' is now issued by the Combaltas and deals with many aspects of Irish Music. All praise to its editor Breandán Breatnach, who also has a splendid volume of dance tunes to bis credit 'Ceól Rince na hÉireann'.
Here at my work under the Sign of The Three Candles I have bad visitors from many countries, all anxious to learn more about our home and bearth. ballads, to compare them with their own folk-songs. Some were interested in narrative songs, some in the praises of Nature, some in the simple love-songs so many in every land. Even the world of politics must take note of current affairs as interpreted by the ballad maker and carried in the ballad-singer's sheaf.
Now there is hardly a programme on radio or tele- vision without the ballad-singer either solo or in groups. On Radio Eireann we had one called The Ballad makers' Saturday Night' and another 'A Job of Journeywork'. The Rambling House' revived the convivial atmosphere of an old-time inn, where various charácters happen in of an evening. Only a few weeks ago I heard that epic of the boxing ring DONNELLY AND COOPER, and my old favourite BRIAN O LYNN in which I can claim a few verses as my own. Another good programme is 'Ceólta Tire' with Ciarán Mac Mathúna as compère (Ceann Siamsa is the right word- the Head of Jollity or Master of the Revels), and his wife Dolly, finest ballad singer of all.
They are not easy to sing, these ballads of ours. One of my counsels to learners is to avoid over-doing the accent and pronunciation, or consciously imitating anyone; in other words not to put on anything or take off anybody'. Strict musical time-beat is impossible; the words take charge of the rhythm and tempo, notes must be split up, shortened or lengthened as the meter of the words dictates. 'Rubato' is the order of the day.
Great joy it was to me when an American edition of IRISH STREET BALLADS came out (with a foreword by my friend Frank O Connor) to serve a wider public in America and Canada. If the interest shown at home and abroad is any index to the success of my second collection, I need have no fears. It has not been easy to pick a second hundred as good as the first. Indeed the problem is still one of selection.
In my first venture I tried to find a hundred good anonymous songs. In spite of me a few by known authors wandered in, as I found them in the pedlar's pack. Here, in response to many requests, are included some good songs by William Allingham from The winding banks of Erne'; T. D. Sullivan from Bantry with bis songs of the Land League; Francis Faby from Kinvara, known the world over for The Ould Plaid Shawl'; Lynn Doyle and Cathal O Byrne, both singing of Sweet Portaferry in the Kingdom of Down'. John Keegan Casey's Rising of the Moon' had to be included for the splendid air my grandfather John Carr of Limerick bad to it. (I hate to bear it sung to The Wearing of the Green'-a tune which does not suit at all).
Anyway here is the book, as well as I know how to compile it, design it and print it. Let ye all make good use of it, for truly the ballad though it may vanish from fair-green and market-place has a new lease of life on radio and television. It will be welcomed among the people of this new age, who seek to recapture for a little space the simpler life of an earlier day, to escape the insistent clangour of the modern world. Let them thank God for the ballad-maker, the ballad-singer, and the ballad-monger Colm O Lochlainn, who also thanks God for having lived 73 years to finish this.
Lá Sambua, 1965.
Our Tailpieces, many of them, were set at the bead of crudely printed ballad slips, the stock-in-trade for centuries of itinerant singers.
Seven have been recut from prints of actual wood engravings from the band of Thomas Bewick of Newcastle-on-Tyne, lent me by a descendant, Miss Pauline Bewick of Dublin. They appear on pages xii, 21, 27.45.77,117,159. All praise to him and thanks to ber.
Dean Swift's ROYAL PRIMER printed in Dublin provided many more. For them I thank my friend and fellow-printer John Cheney of Banbury who restored my nursery copy of BANBURY CHAP BOOKS, sorely mutilated ere I came to the use of reason.
From the self-same book came the large cut of GOODY TWO SHOES, page 55. Frontispiece it was to Oliver Goldsmith's tiny play-book printed by bis publisher friend John Newbury. This also is an early Bewick, as are those on pages 23, 91, 113, 117.
Bewick's daughter has left it on record that when Goldsmith met her father be expressed delight with the cuts and confessed to writing GOODY TWO SHOES, TOMMY TRIPP and the like. Pot-boilers these were for poor Noll, who so loved little children. END
A quarterly magazine Ceól' is now issued by the Combaltas and deals with many aspects of Irish Music. All praise to its editor Breandán Breatnach, who also has a splendid volume of dance tunes to bis credit 'Ceól Rince na hÉireann'.
Here at my work under the Sign of The Three Candles I have bad visitors from many countries, all anxious to learn more about our home and bearth. ballads, to compare them with their own folk-songs. Some were interested in narrative songs, some in the praises of Nature, some in the simple love-songs so many in every land. Even the world of politics must take note of current affairs as interpreted by the ballad maker and carried in the ballad-singer's sheaf.
Now there is hardly a programme on radio or tele- vision without the ballad-singer either solo or in groups. On Radio Eireann we had one called The Ballad makers' Saturday Night' and another 'A Job of Journeywork'. The Rambling House' revived the convivial atmosphere of an old-time inn, where various charácters happen in of an evening. Only a few weeks ago I heard that epic of the boxing ring DONNELLY AND COOPER, and my old favourite BRIAN O LYNN in which I can claim a few verses as my own. Another good programme is 'Ceólta Tire' with Ciarán Mac Mathúna as compère (Ceann Siamsa is the right word- the Head of Jollity or Master of the Revels), and his wife Dolly, finest ballad singer of all.
They are not easy to sing, these ballads of ours. One of my counsels to learners is to avoid over-doing the accent and pronunciation, or consciously imitating anyone; in other words not to put on anything or take off anybody'. Strict musical time-beat is impossible; the words take charge of the rhythm and tempo, notes must be split up, shortened or lengthened as the meter of the words dictates. 'Rubato' is the order of the day.
Great joy it was to me when an American edition of IRISH STREET BALLADS came out (with a foreword by my friend Frank O Connor) to serve a wider public in America and Canada. If the interest shown at home and abroad is any index to the success of my second collection, I need have no fears. It has not been easy to pick a second hundred as good as the first. Indeed the problem is still one of selection.
In my first venture I tried to find a hundred good anonymous songs. In spite of me a few by known authors wandered in, as I found them in the pedlar's pack. Here, in response to many requests, are included some good songs by William Allingham from The winding banks of Erne'; T. D. Sullivan from Bantry with bis songs of the Land League; Francis Faby from Kinvara, known the world over for The Ould Plaid Shawl'; Lynn Doyle and Cathal O Byrne, both singing of Sweet Portaferry in the Kingdom of Down'. John Keegan Casey's Rising of the Moon' had to be included for the splendid air my grandfather John Carr of Limerick bad to it. (I hate to bear it sung to The Wearing of the Green'-a tune which does not suit at all).
Anyway here is the book, as well as I know how to compile it, design it and print it. Let ye all make good use of it, for truly the ballad though it may vanish from fair-green and market-place has a new lease of life on radio and television. It will be welcomed among the people of this new age, who seek to recapture for a little space the simpler life of an earlier day, to escape the insistent clangour of the modern world. Let them thank God for the ballad-maker, the ballad-singer, and the ballad-monger Colm O Lochlainn, who also thanks God for having lived 73 years to finish this.
Lá Sambua, 1965.
Our Tailpieces, many of them, were set at the bead of crudely printed ballad slips, the stock-in-trade for centuries of itinerant singers.
Seven have been recut from prints of actual wood engravings from the band of Thomas Bewick of Newcastle-on-Tyne, lent me by a descendant, Miss Pauline Bewick of Dublin. They appear on pages xii, 21, 27.45.77,117,159. All praise to him and thanks to ber.
Dean Swift's ROYAL PRIMER printed in Dublin provided many more. For them I thank my friend and fellow-printer John Cheney of Banbury who restored my nursery copy of BANBURY CHAP BOOKS, sorely mutilated ere I came to the use of reason.
From the self-same book came the large cut of GOODY TWO SHOES, page 55. Frontispiece it was to Oliver Goldsmith's tiny play-book printed by bis publisher friend John Newbury. This also is an early Bewick, as are those on pages 23, 91, 113, 117.
Bewick's daughter has left it on record that when Goldsmith met her father be expressed delight with the cuts and confessed to writing GOODY TWO SHOES, TOMMY TRIPP and the like. Pot-boilers these were for poor Noll, who so loved little children. END
THE BOOK OF IRISH BALLADS" was first published in 1846 as a companion volume to "THE BALLAD POETRY OF IRELAND," then recently edited with so much taste and ability by Mr., now the Hon. Gavan Duffy. The near relationship of the two books naturally secured for the latter a portion of the unprecedented success which had been at once attained by the former. Like its elder brother, it was received with eager welcome in many successive editions at home, and with it eventually emigrated to the United States, where the original stereotype plates, though now much worn and defaced, are still in their way doing good service.
The book, however, had some grave defects, which I have been long anxious to remove, and it was therefore with much pleasure that I acquiesced in the wish conveyed to me by the excellent and patriotic publisher, that I should revise and recast, if I thought proper, this the second collection of ballads in English, by native Irish writers, that had ever been attempted. Not to speak of minorinac- curacies, principally typographical, which might have been silently emended, "THE BOOK OF IRISH BALLADS" (as, for shortness sake, they must be called) laboured under the disadvantage of containing several poems which, however excellent as rhythmical tales or emotional lyrics, were either absolutely un-Irish in expression, or, when the sentiment and language were local, the form and treatment were opposed to that rapidity of movement and of meter, without which no poem can be said to be a ballad.
As an example of the first class, I may mention the poem with which the volume originally opened. It was the "Fairy Tale" of Parnell. This poem, which should, as it were, have struck the key-note of the whole book, was written, as the author himself says, in the ancient English style."-a style that * has never had a local habitation in this country. Others that had not this obvious defect of language could not, in any sense of the word, be considered ballads. Of these, perhaps "The Saint's Tenant," by Thomas Furlong, was the most striking example. It is a painful story, and all the more painful that it is true. It is told, too, with a bitterness that may well be excused in one who had the misfortune of living at a time when such a system of intolerance and injustice was fostered and enforced by the so-called government of the country; but it is as little of a ballad as one of the tales of Crabbe. How the same subject could be thrown into a ballad form and vivified by a ballad spirit, was evidenced in the volume itself by the poem of The Penal Days," written by the author of the exquisite Idyll, The Old Story," which, for the first time correctly printed, I have the pleasure of introducing into the present edition.
The book, however, had some grave defects, which I have been long anxious to remove, and it was therefore with much pleasure that I acquiesced in the wish conveyed to me by the excellent and patriotic publisher, that I should revise and recast, if I thought proper, this the second collection of ballads in English, by native Irish writers, that had ever been attempted. Not to speak of minorinac- curacies, principally typographical, which might have been silently emended, "THE BOOK OF IRISH BALLADS" (as, for shortness sake, they must be called) laboured under the disadvantage of containing several poems which, however excellent as rhythmical tales or emotional lyrics, were either absolutely un-Irish in expression, or, when the sentiment and language were local, the form and treatment were opposed to that rapidity of movement and of meter, without which no poem can be said to be a ballad.
As an example of the first class, I may mention the poem with which the volume originally opened. It was the "Fairy Tale" of Parnell. This poem, which should, as it were, have struck the key-note of the whole book, was written, as the author himself says, in the ancient English style."-a style that * has never had a local habitation in this country. Others that had not this obvious defect of language could not, in any sense of the word, be considered ballads. Of these, perhaps "The Saint's Tenant," by Thomas Furlong, was the most striking example. It is a painful story, and all the more painful that it is true. It is told, too, with a bitterness that may well be excused in one who had the misfortune of living at a time when such a system of intolerance and injustice was fostered and enforced by the so-called government of the country; but it is as little of a ballad as one of the tales of Crabbe. How the same subject could be thrown into a ballad form and vivified by a ballad spirit, was evidenced in the volume itself by the poem of The Penal Days," written by the author of the exquisite Idyll, The Old Story," which, for the first time correctly printed, I have the pleasure of introducing into the present edition.
Why, or on what principle I acted in introducing these and a few other poems, to which a similar objection would apply, I cannot at this moment deter- mine. It was not for want of materials, for most of the ballads by which they are now replaced were then written. Scanty as the supply was some twenty-five years ago, com- pared with the abundant harvests of Irish song that now await to be gathered into granaries and so preserved, neither Mr. Duffy nor I had any serious difficulty in making our collections. Our principal merit lay in beginning the work at all.
In this way I have often found a pleasure in fancing that in our more limited sphere we acted something like Juan de Timoneda and others, who in Valencia, or Seville, during the sixteenth century, commenced those precious little Romanceros and Cancioneros, out of which eventually the Romancero General or great Ballad-book of Spain was compiled. The materials for such a complete collection in Ireland are every day accumulating, and I have no doubt, that when the fit time arrives, an Irish Duran will be found as competent and enthusiastic as the Spaniard, in arranging and elucidating the rich stories of Irish Ballad Poetry which will then be at his disposal. To return to my own little volume, having the opportunity of removing the defects I have alluded to, I thought I would be failing in my chief duty as an editor if I failed to do so. 1 have, therefore, rejected every poem that could not fairly be con sidered from its form or sentiment an Irish Ballad. Having thus referred to the class of poems which I have removed from the present edition, it remains for me only to allude to a few of those that take their place. I have already mentioned "The Old Story"-a sweet and tender Idyll, the very purity of which alone would make it Irish. Parnell's "Fairy Tale" gives way, though not exactly in the same position, to "The Fairies' Passage" of Mangan, which will be new to most of my readers, and which, though founded on a German original, is so characteristic of the writer, as well as "the good people" it describes in such a lively way, that I have no hesitation in claiming it as an Irish ballad, and have had no scruple in altering a few letters to adapt it to this country. As I have said, the first poem in such a collection as this should strike, as it were, the key. note of the volume.
In this way I have often found a pleasure in fancing that in our more limited sphere we acted something like Juan de Timoneda and others, who in Valencia, or Seville, during the sixteenth century, commenced those precious little Romanceros and Cancioneros, out of which eventually the Romancero General or great Ballad-book of Spain was compiled. The materials for such a complete collection in Ireland are every day accumulating, and I have no doubt, that when the fit time arrives, an Irish Duran will be found as competent and enthusiastic as the Spaniard, in arranging and elucidating the rich stories of Irish Ballad Poetry which will then be at his disposal. To return to my own little volume, having the opportunity of removing the defects I have alluded to, I thought I would be failing in my chief duty as an editor if I failed to do so. 1 have, therefore, rejected every poem that could not fairly be con sidered from its form or sentiment an Irish Ballad. Having thus referred to the class of poems which I have removed from the present edition, it remains for me only to allude to a few of those that take their place. I have already mentioned "The Old Story"-a sweet and tender Idyll, the very purity of which alone would make it Irish. Parnell's "Fairy Tale" gives way, though not exactly in the same position, to "The Fairies' Passage" of Mangan, which will be new to most of my readers, and which, though founded on a German original, is so characteristic of the writer, as well as "the good people" it describes in such a lively way, that I have no hesitation in claiming it as an Irish ballad, and have had no scruple in altering a few letters to adapt it to this country. As I have said, the first poem in such a collection as this should strike, as it were, the key. note of the volume.
This note is now struck, and struck effectively, by the elegy on THOMAS DAVIS, which is not only a most pathetic lamentation on his death, but a powerful figurative picture of his life and of his work. In the title which I have given it (for in the long prose article where hitherto it has been lost, it has none), I have drawn attention to the three aspects of his career which the poem presents with such felicity and power. As to its literary merits, it seems to me as if the very spirit of the ancient Gaelic Bards breathes in this fine composition. As a specimen of Anglo-Irish versification, it is, I think, the most successful and vigorous effort of its author, for, though published anonymously, there can be no possible doubt as to who he is. The style is as marked and unmistakeable as a ballad by Browning. The Battle of Tyrrell's-Pass, by the author of "The Monks of Kilcrea," supplies the place of Grana Uaile and Elizabeth, a picturesque and pleasing poem, but written in the Spenserian stanza, a mea- sure which Scott himself could not bend to the requirements of the ballad. I have retained the historical ballads from Scandinavian Sagas, by the gifted and ill-fated M'Gee, though ballads by him more directly Irish in language and subject could be found, principally because those I allude to are not in the selections from his poems given by Mr. Hayes in "The Ballads of Ireland."
Thave, nowever added his melodious and thoughtful poem of The River Boyne is a sort of moral to the Orange Ballad on The Battle of the Boyne, by Colonel Blacker, which I have retained. With regard to my own pieces, I have withdrawn two of my most popular and best-known lyrics to make room for poems more in accordance with the strict rules I have prescribed to myself in preparing this new edition. Two or three smaller pieces are omitted, as possessing no particular Irish interest; their place being supplied by poems which, from their subjects, are sure of meeting with a wider and more general sympathy; and which are for the first time included in any of our ballad books. The original Introduction I have left pretty much as it was. Had I to write it now, "the years that bring the philosophic mind." would doubtless have moderated somewhat of its enthusiasm; but, as the book will principally be in the hands of the young, I think it better still to appeal to those feelings which they possess, and which I myself would be sorry to have outgrown. With these changes, and with these observations, I take my final leave of "The Book of Irish Ballads."
D. F. MAC-CARTHY.
Thave, nowever added his melodious and thoughtful poem of The River Boyne is a sort of moral to the Orange Ballad on The Battle of the Boyne, by Colonel Blacker, which I have retained. With regard to my own pieces, I have withdrawn two of my most popular and best-known lyrics to make room for poems more in accordance with the strict rules I have prescribed to myself in preparing this new edition. Two or three smaller pieces are omitted, as possessing no particular Irish interest; their place being supplied by poems which, from their subjects, are sure of meeting with a wider and more general sympathy; and which are for the first time included in any of our ballad books. The original Introduction I have left pretty much as it was. Had I to write it now, "the years that bring the philosophic mind." would doubtless have moderated somewhat of its enthusiasm; but, as the book will principally be in the hands of the young, I think it better still to appeal to those feelings which they possess, and which I myself would be sorry to have outgrown. With these changes, and with these observations, I take my final leave of "The Book of Irish Ballads."
D. F. MAC-CARTHY.
IT has been said, by a well-known authority, that the ballads of a people are more influential than their laws, and perhaps he might have added, more valuable than their annals. The most comprehensive survey that the eye of genius can take in-the most ponderous folio that ever owed its existence to the united efforts of industry and dullness, must fail in giving a perfect idea of the character of a people, unless it be based upon the revelations they themselves have made, or the confessions they have uttered. Without these, history is indeed but the "old almanack " that an illustrious countryman of ours has called it; a mere dry dead catalogue of dates and facts, useless either as a picture of the past, or as a lesson for the future. A people of passionate impulses, of throbbing affections, of dauntless heroism, will invariably not only have done things worthy of being recorded, but will also have recorded them. Myriads of human beings cannot be moved about noiselessly, like an army of shadows. The sullen sound of their advancing will be heard afar off; and those wh see them not, will listen to the shrill music of their fifes and the merry echoes of their bugles. The great heavings of a people's heart, and, from time to time, the necessary purifying of the social atmosphere, will make themselves felt and heard and seen, so that all men may take cognizance there- of-as the waves of the ocean dash against each other with a war-cry, or as the electric spirit proclaimeth its salutary mission in a voice of thunder.
In almost all countries the BALLAD has been the instrument by which the triumphs, the joys, or the sorrows of a people have been proclaimed Its uses have been numerous; its capabilities are boundless Long ago, in the fresh youth and enthusiasm of the world, how harmonious were its modulations-its revelations how divine! Then it sang of gods and heroes, and the milk-expanded warm breasts of the beneficent mother; and the gift of Ceres, and the olive of Minerva, and the purple clusters of the son of Semele. Then it was, that "standing on a pleasant lea," men could Have glimpses that would make them less forlorn, Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea, Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn."
Then it was that the earth was truly peopled. Neither was the air void, nor were the waters desolate.
beauty-Schöne Wesen aus dem Fabelland "t-Shapes of wandered familiarly with men; and nymphs and shepherds, and fauns and hamadryads, danced together beneath the eye of Jove himself in the shadow of blue Olympus, or beside the Venus-bearing foam of the sparkling isle- surrounding Hellespont. Had not poetry preserved this memory of the golden age-had not Hesiod and Homer built their beautiful and majestic structures on the original ballads that were probably floating among the people,- how dark, and gloomy, and indistinct would be our ideas of the old world: What visions that have been delighting the eye of man these three thousand years would have been lost: Of what examples of devotion, of heroism, of love of country, would the sincere and zealous of all nations have been deprived.
Poetry, after all, is the only indestructible gift that genius can bequeath to the world. The shield of Achilles, though the work of a god, has disappeared from the world, but the bounding words in which it has been described are immortal. This very shield itself, as Schiller remarks, is the type of the poet's mind, and of all true poetry. On it, we are told, were figured, not only representations of cities, implements of husbandry, corn-fields and vineyards, sheep and oxen, and other things adapted to particular localities, and which may vary under different circumstances, -but the great fabricator had also introduced representations of the unchangeable wonders of creation, which are the same yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow,-"For in it he represented earth-in it the sea and sky-
In it the never-wearied sun-the moon, exactly round;
And all those stars with which the brows of ample heaven are crowned!" Thus a genuine poem must be true not only to the character of the age in which it is written, but in accordance with the principles of nature and of truth, which are un- changeable.
Then it was that the earth was truly peopled. Neither was the air void, nor were the waters desolate.
beauty-Schöne Wesen aus dem Fabelland "t-Shapes of wandered familiarly with men; and nymphs and shepherds, and fauns and hamadryads, danced together beneath the eye of Jove himself in the shadow of blue Olympus, or beside the Venus-bearing foam of the sparkling isle- surrounding Hellespont. Had not poetry preserved this memory of the golden age-had not Hesiod and Homer built their beautiful and majestic structures on the original ballads that were probably floating among the people,- how dark, and gloomy, and indistinct would be our ideas of the old world: What visions that have been delighting the eye of man these three thousand years would have been lost: Of what examples of devotion, of heroism, of love of country, would the sincere and zealous of all nations have been deprived.
Poetry, after all, is the only indestructible gift that genius can bequeath to the world. The shield of Achilles, though the work of a god, has disappeared from the world, but the bounding words in which it has been described are immortal. This very shield itself, as Schiller remarks, is the type of the poet's mind, and of all true poetry. On it, we are told, were figured, not only representations of cities, implements of husbandry, corn-fields and vineyards, sheep and oxen, and other things adapted to particular localities, and which may vary under different circumstances, -but the great fabricator had also introduced representations of the unchangeable wonders of creation, which are the same yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow,-"For in it he represented earth-in it the sea and sky-
In it the never-wearied sun-the moon, exactly round;
And all those stars with which the brows of ample heaven are crowned!" Thus a genuine poem must be true not only to the character of the age in which it is written, but in accordance with the principles of nature and of truth, which are un- changeable.
The Latins, a people very different from the Greeks, added but little to the beauty of the mythology they borrowed, or to the literature they imitated. With the exception of Egeria,-"a beautiful thought, and softly bodied forth," there are none of their native divinities that interest us much. Their early history, so full of stern, unbending justice, self-denial, and heroism, is considered either allegorical or wholly fabulous, and founded upon the memory of rude ballads, which had ceased to exist even at the time when their earliest annals were written. In their latter years, the lyrics of Horace redeemed the character of their literature from the reproach of servile imitation; and some of these, and a few of the shorter tales of Ovid, are the only poems they have left us partaking, however remotely, of the character of Ballad Poetry, but much closer to the modern than to the ancient Homeric standard. After this there is no trace of the ballad spirit in Latin literature. Its writers became more servile and less vigorous in their imitation, until, in the reign of Theodosius, the race of old Roman poets became extinct in the person of Claudian.
While this lamentable but natural decline of intellectual vigour, consequent upon the effeminacy and excesses of Imperial Rome, was developing itself along the sunny shores of the Mediterranean, a new order of things was maturing amid the mountains and forests of northern and western Europe. The human mind-which, in these re- mote regions, like their wintry seas, had been perpetually frozen-now began to melt and dissolve into brilliancy and activity. Those who lived upon the stormy shores of the ocean followed the Sea Kings in their adventurous expedi tions among the islands. Those who lived amid the dark forests of the interior, marched in search of brighter skies and more fruitful plains, towards the genial regions of the south.
And it was in these expeditions, particularly the former, that the Bards of the Sea Kings gave the ballad its modern shape and character. The sagas composed by them, to commemorate the triumphs or to bewail the disasters of their chiefs in "Icy Ierne"-the Scottish islands and Iceland-strongly resemble, both in structure and de- sign, the more vigorous of the modern ballads. A new race of divinities and a new race of heroes superseded the old classical models. Thor and Wodin succeeded Mars and the son of Priam, and. like the songs in which they were commemorated, what they lost in interest and beauty was compensated for by vigor and durability. The black and chilly waters of the northern seas were not a fitting birth- place for the Aphrodisian Venus; instead of the queen of love and gladness, the mighty kraken and the winged dragon were their children, who in many a stormy ballad have played their fearful and important parts ever since.
Again, in the sunny South, but not in exhausted Italy did the harmony of song arise. Spain, that magnificent country, combining together the grandeur and the beauty of the North and South-the bold mountains and caverned shores of Norway, and the enchanting graces of Parthe- nope-had already, even in the most palmy days of Latin literature, contributed some of the most boasted names to the catalogue of Roman writers. Lucan, who sang of Pharsalia; the two Senecas, the younger of whom is the only Roman tragic writer who has come down to us; and Martial, whose wit and licentiousness at once enlivened and disgraced the reign of Domitian, were natives of Spain; the three former of Corduba, and the latter of Aragon. But it was in the eighth century that the splendour and interest of Spanish history commence. In that century the Saracens conquered Spain, and introduced into it, along with a knowledge of letters and the sciences superior to what was possessed by any other people theu in Europe, all the splendour and imagination of Oriental poetry. About the end of the twelfth century the celebrated poem of "The Cid" was written, commemorating the valorous exploits and adventures of the hero, Rodrigo de Bivar. Since that period Spain has been pre-eminently rich in ballad poetry.
Its grand, sonorous language, so musical as to have earned the epithet of "the poetry of speech," has been employed to good purpose; and nobler ballads than the Spanish, in praise of heroism, of virtue, of piety, and of love, the world has never seen. The capabilities of the ballad have there been put to the severest test. Those of the heroic class, which detail the struggles of the old Spaniards with the Goth or with the Saracen, like Chevy Chase, "stir the heart as if with a trumpet;" while the sighing of a summer breeze in Andalusia is not more soft and gentle than the harmony of the passionate ballads that to this day are sung beneath the curtained balconies of moon- lit Sevilla. Gracilasso, Lopé, Calderon, Cervantes-great names are these, of which Spain and human nature may be proud.
While this lamentable but natural decline of intellectual vigour, consequent upon the effeminacy and excesses of Imperial Rome, was developing itself along the sunny shores of the Mediterranean, a new order of things was maturing amid the mountains and forests of northern and western Europe. The human mind-which, in these re- mote regions, like their wintry seas, had been perpetually frozen-now began to melt and dissolve into brilliancy and activity. Those who lived upon the stormy shores of the ocean followed the Sea Kings in their adventurous expedi tions among the islands. Those who lived amid the dark forests of the interior, marched in search of brighter skies and more fruitful plains, towards the genial regions of the south.
And it was in these expeditions, particularly the former, that the Bards of the Sea Kings gave the ballad its modern shape and character. The sagas composed by them, to commemorate the triumphs or to bewail the disasters of their chiefs in "Icy Ierne"-the Scottish islands and Iceland-strongly resemble, both in structure and de- sign, the more vigorous of the modern ballads. A new race of divinities and a new race of heroes superseded the old classical models. Thor and Wodin succeeded Mars and the son of Priam, and. like the songs in which they were commemorated, what they lost in interest and beauty was compensated for by vigor and durability. The black and chilly waters of the northern seas were not a fitting birth- place for the Aphrodisian Venus; instead of the queen of love and gladness, the mighty kraken and the winged dragon were their children, who in many a stormy ballad have played their fearful and important parts ever since.
Again, in the sunny South, but not in exhausted Italy did the harmony of song arise. Spain, that magnificent country, combining together the grandeur and the beauty of the North and South-the bold mountains and caverned shores of Norway, and the enchanting graces of Parthe- nope-had already, even in the most palmy days of Latin literature, contributed some of the most boasted names to the catalogue of Roman writers. Lucan, who sang of Pharsalia; the two Senecas, the younger of whom is the only Roman tragic writer who has come down to us; and Martial, whose wit and licentiousness at once enlivened and disgraced the reign of Domitian, were natives of Spain; the three former of Corduba, and the latter of Aragon. But it was in the eighth century that the splendour and interest of Spanish history commence. In that century the Saracens conquered Spain, and introduced into it, along with a knowledge of letters and the sciences superior to what was possessed by any other people theu in Europe, all the splendour and imagination of Oriental poetry. About the end of the twelfth century the celebrated poem of "The Cid" was written, commemorating the valorous exploits and adventures of the hero, Rodrigo de Bivar. Since that period Spain has been pre-eminently rich in ballad poetry.
Its grand, sonorous language, so musical as to have earned the epithet of "the poetry of speech," has been employed to good purpose; and nobler ballads than the Spanish, in praise of heroism, of virtue, of piety, and of love, the world has never seen. The capabilities of the ballad have there been put to the severest test. Those of the heroic class, which detail the struggles of the old Spaniards with the Goth or with the Saracen, like Chevy Chase, "stir the heart as if with a trumpet;" while the sighing of a summer breeze in Andalusia is not more soft and gentle than the harmony of the passionate ballads that to this day are sung beneath the curtained balconies of moon- lit Sevilla. Gracilasso, Lopé, Calderon, Cervantes-great names are these, of which Spain and human nature may be proud.
The Ballad Poetry of England and Scotland has been very copious and very excellent for several centuries; and the ballads of each contrast not so much in merit as in character. In the song, which may be called the very essence and spirit of the ballad, or the musical utterance of feeling and passion in the very proxysm of their presence, Scotland has immeasurably the superiority. In that Py thian moment, when the mind is in its state of utmost activity, and the dominancy of passion is supreme, the concentrated expression of both is song; and its appearance and the frequency of its return depend principally upon the character and constitution of each people. The ballad, on the contrary, requires not the same degree of excitement-narrative, which is almost an essential portion of it, being incompatible with that mental and sensuous excitation which gives birth to the song, and which is but momentary in its abiding. And thus the different success of the two, in the different nations of Europe, is as marked and distinct as the races of which they are composed.
In Italy and France, in Scotland and Ireland-all nations sprung from the one family-the song has been cultivated with the greatest suocess: whereas in the northern nations, in Germany and in England, the natural expression of the poetical instincts of the people has been through the calmer and more lengthened channel of the ballad. Spain has succeeded better in both, perhaps, than any other nation- the dominion of the Goths leaving after it much of the solemnity of thought and feeling of the Germanic races, while the lyric capabilities of the language are such as to render the expression of high-wrought sentiment easy and obvious. In England the ballads are generally of a quiet and pastoral beauty-quite in character with the rural and sylvan charms of its scenery. The Robin Hood ballads, which so delight us in boyhood, and which give us visions of "Merry Sherwood".
In summer time, when leaves grow green,
And bird sing on every tree,
that we never forget, and which are only replaced by the still more exquisite glimpses that Shakespeare opens to us of The Forest of Ardennes-all partake of this character. In them there is many a merry trick played, and many a mad adventure-
"Of brave little John.
Of Friar Tuck and Will Scarlet, Loxley, and Maid Marion."
Bold Robin and Allin-a-Dale, or the "Jolly Tanner" Arthur-a-Bland, have many a good contest with stout quarter-staffs-right merry to read and well described; but the writers scarcely ever forget, even for a few stanzas, the beauty of the summer woods where their heroes dwell, and satisfy their own hearts, and will delight their readers for all time, by this frequent recurrence to the unchangeable and everlasting delights of nature. Indeed, this continued reference to the beauty of the external world, which we meet in the old English poets, particularly in Chaucer (whose pictures of many a "May Morning" are still so fresh after many years), may be the reason that they are read even now, notwithstanding the difficulties of an anti- quated and obsolete dialect.
The Scotch ballads are less numerous and less varied than the English; but in point of perfection-in the par- ticular class, at least, of sentiment and the affections- they are not only superior to these, but, as I humbly conceive, to any ballads that have ever been written. Their simplicity never degenerates into bald commonplace, nor their homeli- ness into vulgarity; and they are as far removed from maudlin sentimentality in their passionate heartiness, as from frigid conceits and pettiness in their illustrations. The very hearts of the Scottish people bound in their ballads; we can listen to the ever-varying changes of its pulsation; now heavy and slow as the tides of Loch Lomond, now rapid and bounding as the billows of the Clyde. The "bonny blue e'en" of the lassie glance through her waving hair like a stream through the overhanging heather; and her arch reply or her merry laugh rings on our ears like the song of the mavis or the throstle. The ballads of a few of her humblest children have rendered Scotland dear to the hearts of all whose affections are worth possessing; they have converted (to the mind at least) her desolate heaths and barren mountains, into smiling gardens and olive-bearing hills; and have constructed amongst mists and storms, and the howling of the lashed Northern Ocean, an Arcadia dearer than that of yore, where the shepherd's boy piped as though he should never be old." Although my space here is very limited, I cannot refrain from presenting to some of my readers, perhaps for the first time, a specimen of these ballads, taken almost at random, in support of what I have asserted, and as a model (in connection with those written in a kindred spirit by some of our own countrymen -Griffin, Callanan, Davis, and Mr. Ferguson) of this most exquisite department of Ballad Poetry:-
MARY OF CASTLE-CARY.+
SAW ye my wee thing, saw ye my ain thing,
Saw ye my trus-iove down on you lea-
Crossed she the meadow yestreen at the gloaming,
Sought she the burnie where flowers the haw-tros?
Her hair it is lint-white, her skin it is milk-white,
Dark is the blue of her soft rolling e'e;
Red, red are her ripe lips, and sweeter than roses,
Where could my wee thing wander frae me?
I saw nae your wee thing, I saw nae your ain thing.
Nor saw I your true-love down by yon lea;
Sir Philip Sidney.
Written by Hector MacNeill; born 1746, died 1818
In Italy and France, in Scotland and Ireland-all nations sprung from the one family-the song has been cultivated with the greatest suocess: whereas in the northern nations, in Germany and in England, the natural expression of the poetical instincts of the people has been through the calmer and more lengthened channel of the ballad. Spain has succeeded better in both, perhaps, than any other nation- the dominion of the Goths leaving after it much of the solemnity of thought and feeling of the Germanic races, while the lyric capabilities of the language are such as to render the expression of high-wrought sentiment easy and obvious. In England the ballads are generally of a quiet and pastoral beauty-quite in character with the rural and sylvan charms of its scenery. The Robin Hood ballads, which so delight us in boyhood, and which give us visions of "Merry Sherwood".
In summer time, when leaves grow green,
And bird sing on every tree,
that we never forget, and which are only replaced by the still more exquisite glimpses that Shakespeare opens to us of The Forest of Ardennes-all partake of this character. In them there is many a merry trick played, and many a mad adventure-
"Of brave little John.
Of Friar Tuck and Will Scarlet, Loxley, and Maid Marion."
Bold Robin and Allin-a-Dale, or the "Jolly Tanner" Arthur-a-Bland, have many a good contest with stout quarter-staffs-right merry to read and well described; but the writers scarcely ever forget, even for a few stanzas, the beauty of the summer woods where their heroes dwell, and satisfy their own hearts, and will delight their readers for all time, by this frequent recurrence to the unchangeable and everlasting delights of nature. Indeed, this continued reference to the beauty of the external world, which we meet in the old English poets, particularly in Chaucer (whose pictures of many a "May Morning" are still so fresh after many years), may be the reason that they are read even now, notwithstanding the difficulties of an anti- quated and obsolete dialect.
The Scotch ballads are less numerous and less varied than the English; but in point of perfection-in the par- ticular class, at least, of sentiment and the affections- they are not only superior to these, but, as I humbly conceive, to any ballads that have ever been written. Their simplicity never degenerates into bald commonplace, nor their homeli- ness into vulgarity; and they are as far removed from maudlin sentimentality in their passionate heartiness, as from frigid conceits and pettiness in their illustrations. The very hearts of the Scottish people bound in their ballads; we can listen to the ever-varying changes of its pulsation; now heavy and slow as the tides of Loch Lomond, now rapid and bounding as the billows of the Clyde. The "bonny blue e'en" of the lassie glance through her waving hair like a stream through the overhanging heather; and her arch reply or her merry laugh rings on our ears like the song of the mavis or the throstle. The ballads of a few of her humblest children have rendered Scotland dear to the hearts of all whose affections are worth possessing; they have converted (to the mind at least) her desolate heaths and barren mountains, into smiling gardens and olive-bearing hills; and have constructed amongst mists and storms, and the howling of the lashed Northern Ocean, an Arcadia dearer than that of yore, where the shepherd's boy piped as though he should never be old." Although my space here is very limited, I cannot refrain from presenting to some of my readers, perhaps for the first time, a specimen of these ballads, taken almost at random, in support of what I have asserted, and as a model (in connection with those written in a kindred spirit by some of our own countrymen -Griffin, Callanan, Davis, and Mr. Ferguson) of this most exquisite department of Ballad Poetry:-
MARY OF CASTLE-CARY.+
SAW ye my wee thing, saw ye my ain thing,
Saw ye my trus-iove down on you lea-
Crossed she the meadow yestreen at the gloaming,
Sought she the burnie where flowers the haw-tros?
Her hair it is lint-white, her skin it is milk-white,
Dark is the blue of her soft rolling e'e;
Red, red are her ripe lips, and sweeter than roses,
Where could my wee thing wander frae me?
I saw nae your wee thing, I saw nae your ain thing.
Nor saw I your true-love down by yon lea;
Sir Philip Sidney.
Written by Hector MacNeill; born 1746, died 1818
The most modern, and perhaps the most important class of ballads, remains to be alluded to-namely, the German. The sudden awakening, the rapid maturity, the enduring vitality, and the acknowledged supremacy of German literature, are facts as wonderful as they are consoling. Little better than a century ago, with the exception of a few theological and historical writers, the Germans were more destitute of a native literature, and were more dependant on other countries, particularly France, for intellectual supplies, than we have ever been; and now their works crowd the book markets of the world. Little more than a century ago a German prince, Frederick the Great, a phi losopher and a patron of philosophers, pronounced his native language but fit for horses,-little dreaming of the angels and angelic women-of the Katherines, the Tecklas, and the Undinês-from whose inspired lips that rough, nervous language would flow so harmoniously that all men would listen to the melody thereof. In no intellectual field have the Germans of the past and present centuries been defeated. Their drama is superior to any other that has appeared in Europe during the same period-for I pre- sume there can be no comparison between the Shaksperian power of Schiller and the soft graces of Metastasio, or even the more maculine classicalities of Alfieri.
Their histories are the mines in which even the most industrious writers search for the precious ore of truth. Their philosophy has been either a beacon or an ignis fatuus to the inquiring intellects of Europe; while some of their artists have come off victo- rious even in the Eternal Metropolis of art itself. In every department of literature, German intellect has been renewing the almost exhausted fountains of the world. Like the Egyptian river, the great German Rhine has been over- flowing the earth, and fruits, and flowers, and waving corn are springing luxuriantly in all lands. In the ballad the Germans have pre-eminently succeeded. It is with them somewhat of a short epic, in which the romance and chivalry of the middle ages find a suitable vehicle for their illustration. They seldom treat of humble life and simple passion, like the Scotch; or individual heroism, like the Spanish.
They are more historical and legendary than directly sentimental or heroic; but through all runs a vein of philosophical abstraction and thoughtful melancholy, which in:parts to them a peculiar and enduring charm. There is scarcely an historical event of any importance-a legend possessing the slightest interest-a superstition not destitute of grace, sublimity, or terror-a river or a mountain that has anything to recommend it, that has not found an illustrator, an admirer, and a laureate among the German Balladists. And the consequence is, that not only is the German intellect honoured and respected, but the German land is also strengthened and enriched. The separate though confederated nations of Germany have been bound *together as one people, by the universal language of their poetry; and year after year pilgrims and students from strange lands wander thither, not attracted so much by the gloom of her woody mountains and the magic windings of her Rhine, as because (thanks to poetry) through the former the wild Jager still hunts and the witches dance on Walpurgist nights, and because the latter has been made the crystal barrier of a free people, and the emblem, in its depth, its strength, and its beauty, of the German character and intellect.
It only remains for me to advert to what has been done, and what I conceive may be done, in Ireland with the ballad. If we recollect the constant state of warfare-the revolution upon revolution-the political struggles, and the generally unsettled condition of the people ever since the invasion, it is matter of surprise that there could be found any persons with hearts or intellects sufficiently strong to escape from the realities around them into the abstractions and idealities of poetry; but that there were many who did so, and with a power and beauty for which they get little credit, must be evident from Mr. Duffy's "Ballad Poetry," and, I trust, also from this volume. 1 speak now, of course, of our native Gaelic writers. To us there can scarcely be anything more interesting or more valuable than these snatches and fragments of old songs and ballads, which are chapters of a nation's autobiography. Without these how difficult would it be for the best disposed and the most patriotic amongst us to free our minds from the false impressions which the study (superficial as it was) of the history of our country, as told by those who were not her children or her friends, had made upon us. Instead of the rude savage kerns that anti-Irish historians represent our forefathers to have been, for ever hovering with murderous intent round the fortresses of the Pale, we see them, in their own ballads, away in their green valleys and inaccessible mountains, as fathers, as brothers, as lovers, and as husbands, leading the old patriarchal life with their wives and children, while the air is musical with the melody of their harps and the lowing of their cattle we see them hunting the red deer over the brown mountains, or spearing the salmon in the pleasant rivers,—or, borne on their swift horses, descending in many a gallant foray on the startled intruders of the Pale. What is of more importance, we look into the hearts and minds of these people-we see what they love with such passion- what they hate with such intensity-what they revere with such sacred fidelity. We find they had love-they had loyalty they had religion-they had constancy-they had an undying devotion for the "green hills of holy Ireland," and as such they are entitled to our respect, our affections, and our imitation. The best ballads they have left us are those of the affections, and they are, according to Mr. Ferguson, of the utmost possible intensity of passion com patible with the most perfect purity. Even in their political ballads, where a thin disguise was necessary, the allegory has been so perfect, and the wail of sorrow, or the yearning of affection, exquisitely imitated (as in the instance of the Roisin Dhu, or "Dark Rosaleen"), as to make so excellent a critic and so true a poet as Mr. Ferguson doubt if they be in reality political ballads at all.
Upon the subject of our Anglo-Irish Ballads, I have nothing to add to what Mr. Duffy has so ably and so truly written in his Introduction to the "Ballad Poetry o Ireland." That there is a distinct character and a peculiar charm in the best ballads of this class, which the highest genius, unaccompanied by thorough Irish feeling, and a thorough Irish education, would fail to impart to them must be evident to everyone who has read that volume To those among us, and to the generations who are yet to be among us, whose mother tongue is, and of necessity must be, the English and not the Irish, the establishing of this fact is of the utmost importance, and of the greatest consolation-that we can be thoroughly Irish in our feelings without ceasing to be English in our speech; that we can be faithful to the land of our birth, without being ungrateful to that literature which has been "the nursing mother of our minds;" that we can develop the intellectual re- sources of our country, and establish for ourselves a distinct and separate existence in the world of letters. without depriving ourselves of the advantages of the widely-diffused and genius-consecrated language of England, are facts that I conceive cannot be too widely disseminated. This peculiar character of our poetry is, however, not easily imparted. An Irish word or an Irish phrase, even appositely introduced, will not be sufficient; it must pervade the entire poem, and must be seen and felt in the construction, the sentiment, and the expression. Our writers would do well to consider the advantages, even in point of success and popularity, which would be likely to attend the working of this peculiar vein of Anglo-Irish literature. If they write, as they are too much in the habit of doing, in the weak, worn-out style of the majority of contemporary English authors, they will infallibly be lost in the crowd of easy writers and smooth versifiers, whose name is legion, on the other side of the channel; whereas, if they endea vour to be racy of their native soil, use their native idiom, illustrate the character of their country, treasure her legends, eternalize her traditions, people her scenery, and ennoble her superstitions, the very novelty will attract attention and secure success,
1845
Their histories are the mines in which even the most industrious writers search for the precious ore of truth. Their philosophy has been either a beacon or an ignis fatuus to the inquiring intellects of Europe; while some of their artists have come off victo- rious even in the Eternal Metropolis of art itself. In every department of literature, German intellect has been renewing the almost exhausted fountains of the world. Like the Egyptian river, the great German Rhine has been over- flowing the earth, and fruits, and flowers, and waving corn are springing luxuriantly in all lands. In the ballad the Germans have pre-eminently succeeded. It is with them somewhat of a short epic, in which the romance and chivalry of the middle ages find a suitable vehicle for their illustration. They seldom treat of humble life and simple passion, like the Scotch; or individual heroism, like the Spanish.
They are more historical and legendary than directly sentimental or heroic; but through all runs a vein of philosophical abstraction and thoughtful melancholy, which in:parts to them a peculiar and enduring charm. There is scarcely an historical event of any importance-a legend possessing the slightest interest-a superstition not destitute of grace, sublimity, or terror-a river or a mountain that has anything to recommend it, that has not found an illustrator, an admirer, and a laureate among the German Balladists. And the consequence is, that not only is the German intellect honoured and respected, but the German land is also strengthened and enriched. The separate though confederated nations of Germany have been bound *together as one people, by the universal language of their poetry; and year after year pilgrims and students from strange lands wander thither, not attracted so much by the gloom of her woody mountains and the magic windings of her Rhine, as because (thanks to poetry) through the former the wild Jager still hunts and the witches dance on Walpurgist nights, and because the latter has been made the crystal barrier of a free people, and the emblem, in its depth, its strength, and its beauty, of the German character and intellect.
It only remains for me to advert to what has been done, and what I conceive may be done, in Ireland with the ballad. If we recollect the constant state of warfare-the revolution upon revolution-the political struggles, and the generally unsettled condition of the people ever since the invasion, it is matter of surprise that there could be found any persons with hearts or intellects sufficiently strong to escape from the realities around them into the abstractions and idealities of poetry; but that there were many who did so, and with a power and beauty for which they get little credit, must be evident from Mr. Duffy's "Ballad Poetry," and, I trust, also from this volume. 1 speak now, of course, of our native Gaelic writers. To us there can scarcely be anything more interesting or more valuable than these snatches and fragments of old songs and ballads, which are chapters of a nation's autobiography. Without these how difficult would it be for the best disposed and the most patriotic amongst us to free our minds from the false impressions which the study (superficial as it was) of the history of our country, as told by those who were not her children or her friends, had made upon us. Instead of the rude savage kerns that anti-Irish historians represent our forefathers to have been, for ever hovering with murderous intent round the fortresses of the Pale, we see them, in their own ballads, away in their green valleys and inaccessible mountains, as fathers, as brothers, as lovers, and as husbands, leading the old patriarchal life with their wives and children, while the air is musical with the melody of their harps and the lowing of their cattle we see them hunting the red deer over the brown mountains, or spearing the salmon in the pleasant rivers,—or, borne on their swift horses, descending in many a gallant foray on the startled intruders of the Pale. What is of more importance, we look into the hearts and minds of these people-we see what they love with such passion- what they hate with such intensity-what they revere with such sacred fidelity. We find they had love-they had loyalty they had religion-they had constancy-they had an undying devotion for the "green hills of holy Ireland," and as such they are entitled to our respect, our affections, and our imitation. The best ballads they have left us are those of the affections, and they are, according to Mr. Ferguson, of the utmost possible intensity of passion com patible with the most perfect purity. Even in their political ballads, where a thin disguise was necessary, the allegory has been so perfect, and the wail of sorrow, or the yearning of affection, exquisitely imitated (as in the instance of the Roisin Dhu, or "Dark Rosaleen"), as to make so excellent a critic and so true a poet as Mr. Ferguson doubt if they be in reality political ballads at all.
Upon the subject of our Anglo-Irish Ballads, I have nothing to add to what Mr. Duffy has so ably and so truly written in his Introduction to the "Ballad Poetry o Ireland." That there is a distinct character and a peculiar charm in the best ballads of this class, which the highest genius, unaccompanied by thorough Irish feeling, and a thorough Irish education, would fail to impart to them must be evident to everyone who has read that volume To those among us, and to the generations who are yet to be among us, whose mother tongue is, and of necessity must be, the English and not the Irish, the establishing of this fact is of the utmost importance, and of the greatest consolation-that we can be thoroughly Irish in our feelings without ceasing to be English in our speech; that we can be faithful to the land of our birth, without being ungrateful to that literature which has been "the nursing mother of our minds;" that we can develop the intellectual re- sources of our country, and establish for ourselves a distinct and separate existence in the world of letters. without depriving ourselves of the advantages of the widely-diffused and genius-consecrated language of England, are facts that I conceive cannot be too widely disseminated. This peculiar character of our poetry is, however, not easily imparted. An Irish word or an Irish phrase, even appositely introduced, will not be sufficient; it must pervade the entire poem, and must be seen and felt in the construction, the sentiment, and the expression. Our writers would do well to consider the advantages, even in point of success and popularity, which would be likely to attend the working of this peculiar vein of Anglo-Irish literature. If they write, as they are too much in the habit of doing, in the weak, worn-out style of the majority of contemporary English authors, they will infallibly be lost in the crowd of easy writers and smooth versifiers, whose name is legion, on the other side of the channel; whereas, if they endea vour to be racy of their native soil, use their native idiom, illustrate the character of their country, treasure her legends, eternalize her traditions, people her scenery, and ennoble her superstitions, the very novelty will attract attention and secure success,
1845
