AN GAOḊAL.
823
chum an bheatha siorruidhe do shaothrughadh.
The correct form, doubtless, is, in such construct¬
ions, to put the noun after chum in the accusative,
and to take the whole phrase as governed by
chum.
Another error can be corrected by the example
given above, "go d ti an aonach," &c. Go d-ti is
a simple preposition, and like nearly all such prep¬
ositions, it eclipses the noun after it when declined
with the article. (6) Go d ti an bun, then should
be, go d-ti an m-bun. (7) Mr. Russell again says —
Locht d'faghail leat sa, this should be ort sa, (8)
In a g-clodhbhualadh. (8a) Ta me an-bhuidheach
leat, should be doit. The idiom after buidheach,
thankul, is diom, diot, An-buidheach de, I am
thankful of him. O'Donovans's Grammar, p. 162
Bidhim-se buidheace diobh. I do be thankful of
them (Midnight Court.) (9) Fiorbhuideach do'n
should be de'n. Chum in Munster, especially in
Waterford, is corrupted to chun, and in Connaught
the ch is omitted, and the preposition becomes an
(un). (10) Tromdha, grave, serious, is not a com¬
parative from heavy. (11) Muna thaisbeanfainn iad
should be muna d taisbeanfainn iad. Muna causes
eslipses, O'Donovan's Irish Grammar, p. 400.
Eleven blunders are a goodly number enough in
one letter.
Should Mr. Russell, even yet. be able to find any
good writer expressions similar to those found
fault with in the note above, they will be admitted
into the Gaelic Journal, and welcome. And though
he should fail in finding a single such passage — as
I believe he will fail — the search for a couple of
years will form a most healthful exercise. But should
he succeed, no one will rejoice more than I shall.
In the Journal, No. 9, p. 294, I wrote, “A word
in reply to Mr. O’Neill Russell, the gentleman, by
the way of all connected with our movement, with
whom I would rather be at one.” My predecessor
in the editorship of the Journal was still more at¬
tached to Mr. Russell. In his first number, at p.
20 he said, “There are few, indeed, who have labor¬
ed for the cause of the Irish language so earnestly
unselfishly and ably, as Thomas O'Neill Russell
for the past twenty years. We are glad to see he
has not yet wearied of well doing. and it is a source
of great gratification to us that his name appears
among the contributors to our first number,” This
friendly feeling, however, had to give way under
the reiterated insults of Mr. Russell, and this last
notice of Mr. Comyn on the letter of Mr. Russell
dated September, 1883, was penned in a mood very
different from that in which he penned the passage
above. This note is at p 292. No. 9 of the Jour¬
nal. —
“We have been very careful to print this and other
recent letters of his verbatim et literatum, as they
appear in Mr. Russell's MSS. We are consequent¬
ly surprised that he should still find fault with our
action. When we, with his own permission, made
certain changes in previous contributions, he ob¬
jected ; now when we refrain from doing anything
of the kind, he is not pleased. We have carefully
examined the MS. of his letter (which he says we
printed so incorrectly), and we find that every one
of the errors he points out appears in his handwri¬
ting, except the omission, by oversight of one let¬
ter in the word, dearmad . . . We
would ask Mr. Russell to read again our notes at
pp. 20, 172, &c. . . . The letter con¬
cerning the quotation from the Book of Leinster,
if it reached us, must have been mislaid.
As in Mr. Comyn’s case, Mr. Russell, asks me
for some MS. copied from the Book of Leinster.
I have no recollection of having ever seen this MS.
I am quite certain of one thing, that I never looked
into it.
Now I would ask Mr. Russell, should he not dis¬
trust the temper that made him fall out with so ma¬
ny friends at both sides of the Atlantic. At this side
of the Ocean, our text books are being corrupted,
and even our catechisms. Our tomb-stones a bar¬
barous Irish jargon is being cut ; and Mr. Russell
is silent. But when a preacher once or twice uses
a grammatical expression, Mr. Russell fllls a long
column with ungrammatical, but euphonious quo¬
tations, to show the ignorant that the preacher was
not correct.
Our readers may think it strange that so many
good writers should write bad grammar, for it a¬
mounts to this : Great masters of style in all lan¬
guages look more to euphony than strict grammar,
this was especially the case with our best Irish
writers.
In the example I gave before, chum meala do
dhiol, is thought more euphonious than chum mil
do dhiol. All grammarians, and all late writers,
except Mr. Russell, prefer strict grammar, but out
of respect for the great writers they allow both
forms of expression. Another instance of ungram¬
matical euphony is aon n-duine, one man. Noth¬
ing could be more ungrammatical. and yet Dr.
Gallagher writes the phrase three times in one
page, and Dr. Keating also uses the expression in
the preface to his history.
NEAṀ.
A m-buiḋin eile tá papaiḋ agus eas¬
boig agus sagairt, fir a ṁúin agus ċos¬
naiġ an creideaṁ le beul-oideas agus
le sgríḃinn. Le cúṁachta a laḃarṫa a¬
gus le na n-oibreaċaiḃ sgríoḃṫa do sga¬
radar an creideaṁ agus do stiúraḋ¬
ar na fíréin. Táid anois corónta leis
an nglóir airiġe a tá geallta do ḋaoi¬
niḃ d'a leiṫide: "soilseóċaiḋ an dream
atá foġlamṫa mar solus na spéir, ag¬
us iad so a ṫeagasgas mórán ċum fír¬
euntaċta, mar na reultaiḃ air feaḋ na
síoruiġeaċta." Aċt ní ḃeiḋeaḋ na fir
so air neaṁ muna d-teiġeaḋ naoṁ¬
aċt beaṫa agus dócaṁal láiṁ le láiṁ
na d-teagasg. Oir deir ar d-Tiġearna:
"An te a ġniḋeas agus a ṫeagasgas is
sé sin d'a n-goirṫear mór a riġeaċt na
ḃ-flaiṫeas." Na dearmaid: luaċ-saoṫ¬
air air neaṁ air son fulangtas air tal¬
ṁain. Anois is féidir linn ar smuain¬
tiġṫe do ṫaḃairt do ġlóir na maiġdean.
Tugaim arís ó'n taisbeánaḋ: ''Agus
do ċluineas guṫ árd ó neaṁ, agus ḃí
an guṫ a ċluineas aṁail guṫ cláirsiġ¬
ṫeoir aig ceoltóireaċt le na g-cláirsíġ¬
iḃ, agus do ċanadar, mar ḃeiḋeaḋ cain¬
