AN GAOḊAL.
117
[We are not backward in asserting that the fol¬
lowing facts of history are worth a year's subscrip¬
tion to the Gael to any Irishman — Ed.]
THE SAINTED PATRICK.
Welshmen Claim That He Was Born In Wales.
Scotland Submits a Counter Claim And Irishmen
Declare That He Was Born in France. George
Washington Conceded an Extra Gill of Whisky
on the 17th of March.
March 17, St. Patrick's day, is celebrated by the
scattered sons and daughters of Ireland, without
regard to religious creeds or political opinions. No
one can tell when it became a secular holiday, a
day of banners and marching, of feasting and frol¬
ic, but it was of course, at first, a religious festi¬
val, but in process of time it became as national
as St. David's, St. Andrew's, St. George's or St.
Nicholas's day. There is, indeed, little of religion
in them for the Protestant Briton, north or south
of the Tweed. The Catholic Portuguese swear by
St. George of Cappadocia. The venerable Bede,
pride of the ancient English church, records the
life of St. Patrick in his martyrology. The writ¬
ers, however, who give the best and truest narra¬
tives of the saint are Archbishop Usher, Sir James
Ware and Dr. Lanigan. The controversy of his
birthplace is as far from an amicable settlement as
it was 500 years ago. The latest writer on the sub¬
ject is the well known author of the Irish Church
Rev. Sylvester Malone of this city, whose thorough
knowledge of hagiology is second to no ecclesias¬
tic in England or Ireland. He locates the saint's
birthplace as not far from Bristol, Wales.
That Wales and Scotland claimed him — Ireland
never did and and gave his name to their sons is au¬
thenticated by the numerous Patricks in Scottish
and Welsh history. To day, lieutenant generals of
Scottish history are known as Sir Patrick Grant,
and Sir Patrick Craig in the British army. It ne¬
ver was much used in Ireland as a prӕnomen until
about the beginning of this century. There is not
in all the list of Irish bishops in a thousand years
over a dozen Patricks, while the Highlands were
full of them 500 years ago. The Irish priest who
claims Wales as the saint's birthplace is met by
Usher and Harris, two very able writers, who in¬
sist that he was born and buried at Glasgow, while
others assert that he first saw the light at Kilpat¬
rick or Kirkpatrick. Scotland and Wales being
Protestant countries the true Catholic gives the
saint the benefit of the doubt and believes him to
be a native of Tours, Brittany, France.
"The invasion of Gaul by Nial of the Nine Hos¬
tages" was the time when Patrick, who was sup¬
posed to have Roman leanings to their power in
France, was made captive and carried among oth¬
ers to Ireland. At this time his father, Calphur¬
nius, a deacon, was killed. His grandfather, Pot¬
itus, was a priest, — Whence it appears the clergy
(as they did) married in those days, as do the Greek
church priests of Russia today. It is immaterial
where the good saint was born. We know that his
admirers are very numerous on these shores, and
in fact all over the world. How long it is since
Ireland became known to America, or the latter to
the former, it is hard to tell, because we find that
among the first discovers of America with Colum¬
bus was a seaman on board the Pinta named Guil¬
lermo Ires, natural de Galway, Irlanda, (Wm Ey¬
res, native of Galway, Ireland). This is to be found
on the crew list of the first voyage of the great na¬
vigator and can be seen in any volume of Colum¬
bus' first voyage. The intercourse of Spain, parti¬
cularly in the west coast, with Ireland is very re¬
mote. While the English were confined to the Pale
in the counties of the east, the country from the
Lee to Lough Sivilly carried on a flourishing busi¬
ness with France and the peninsula which was al¬
ways a great commercial power and for years was
the first in the world. Irish sailors shipped at Lat¬
waz, Sligo, Westport or Limerick for Cadix, Pal¬
os, Seville, in the south, and Vigo, St. Ander and
St. Sebastian, in the north.
Spanish was fluently spoken in all those Irish
ports, and was the language of the elite as late as
the sixteenth century. * It was the fashion in those
days for Irish lads and lasses to spend from four
to six years at school in Spain as it is for English¬
men to do the same to-day in France, Switzerland
and Germany.
The Irish and English were under one crown
when America was discovered — 1492. Long before
the reign of Henry VIII. the English army was fill¬
ed with Irish youth, and in no battle, especially
upon the plains of Abraham, near Quebec, on this
continent, against the Indian or Frenchman, but
Irish blood was liberally shed. It is true that offi¬
cers were all members of the established church
since the beginning of the sixteenth century, but
the Catholic was cordially welcomed to carry a mus¬
ket. He could not bear a commission.
How friendly Irish intercourse was with the
New England settlements one has only to refer to
Bancroft at the end of the King Philip war in 1675.
Destitution was general and the sufferings of the
people were borne across the sea. The Puritan
was an outcast to the court and, of course, the peo¬
ple of the time of Charles II were as excessively
loyal as their fathers were profoundly sullen when
his father lost his head. The Puritan from 1660 to
1688 was a bete noire, a kind of a Clan Na Gael or
O'Donovan Rossa dynamiter of the ninth decade of
the present century. Representatives of the New
England states, when they landed in England, made
their wants known, but they were frigidly received.
It was well known that several of the Puritan jud¬
ges who had condemned Charles I had taken flight
to New England and were concealed there for years
in spite of the spies and the high price set upon
their heads by the English crown. The people
were in no mood to give aid and assistance to the
Puritans of America. They were having a good
time like their "merry monarch" who was decora¬
ting courtesans with titles and providing, at the
expense of the nation, for his numeros progeny of
"The rank sweat of an enseamed bed."
The brave envoys, however, crossed the Irish
channel and set forth the need of the colonists in
the New England territory. They were hospitab¬
ly received and means were commenced to provide
for their needy compatriots. The brig Kathrine
was chartered and laden with provisons of all kinds
especially seed, grain and the immortal esculent
which virginally came from America in the six¬
teenth century. On Angust 6, 1676, the taut brig
left the port of Dublin for Boston, where she ar¬
rived bearing the gallant convoys and the ample
stores for the sturdy people who had suffered so
much in the Indian war. One hundred and seven¬
ty-one years afterward New England and other
states sent ships, to Ireland laden with cereals
