AN GAODHAL.
111
SENTIMENTS OF OUR SUBSCRIBERS.
Rev. Gerald P. Coghlan, St. Aloysius' Church,
Pottstown, Pa. — * * It is the first Irish News-
paper I have seen. It is an excellent idea and
deserves to succeed. Every Irishman with any
pretention to literary taste ought to encourage
and assist your efforts for the revival of the old
Celtic tongue; but especially should the priests
of Irish birth or extraction become subscribers,
and so contribute even so little to preserve a
language that has been the instrument for pre-
serving the Faith of our Fathers during the dark
ages of the Penal Laws. I have but a most im-
perfect knowledge of the language, but I intend
with God’s help to improve that slight knowledge
by the aid of your Irish books. With best wishes
for your success &c.
J. Finneran St. Louis, Mo. — I feel that the
foundation and chief cornerstone of our nation's
independence will be firmly laid when Irishmen
are conversant with their National Language.
While we speak the bastard Saxon tongue there is
no hope of National pride or united action among
the masses of our people — Such are the sentiments
of the following twelve subscribers sent to us
through the United Irishman by Mr. Finneran —
Messrs. M. Dolan, M. M. Rooney, J. Lysaght,
J. Finneran, T. Maxey, P. Kelly, J. MacInerney,
P. Taffey, J. Ryan, W. Mac Cartin, F. O’Hare,
and J. W. Walsh,
E. F. Delahunty, Promontoy, Utah — Sends his
sentiments with the subscriptions of J. Cahill,
M. Doherty, J. Tagget, M. Brady and E. F. Dela-
hunty.
— Similar sentiments from Miss Purcell, New York.
T. Donovan Lynn, Mass., Edward Sylvester Mc.
Ginnis, Stubenville, Ohio, A. Whelan, Bellaire,
Ohio, D. O’Reilly, Philadelphia, Penn. D. Law-
ler, San Francisco, Cal. J. Barry, Indianapolis
Ind., John Duane, New York, John Byrne Bal-
timore, Md. and J. Hickey, Pittsburg, Pa.
Some of the foregoing communications are very
lengthy, and if all were inserted would occupy
the columns of the GAEL altogether.
The movement for the preservation of the Irish
language is the grandest ever put on foot for the
social advancement of the Irish people. It places
before the world the evidence of their ancient cul-
tivation. Nations, like individuals, may be en-
slaved, persecuted and impoverished but never
degraded except by their own volition. The Celtic
is a proud race unless the chains of slavery have
cut off all sense of manhood. The force of ex¬
ample has a great effect on the human mind,
physicians assert that continuous confinement
predisposes to idiocy and that if such confinement
be with deranged persons, it becomes dangerous
Hence we are led to believe that those who still
say “What good is the language,” are mentally
affected so as not to see the point which the cul-
tivation of the language presents, which may be
summed up thus —
Firstly, no people can have any pretense to
respectability without a cultivated language and
literature.
Secondly, the language itself is the only evi-
dence of its existence.
Thirdly, no man or body of men can deprive a
man of his social status,
Fourthly, no amount of wordly wealth can confer
real dignity.
Suppose a wealthy merchant of New York, say,
who was of a lowly origin, by some misfortune
lost all his wealth, and was obliged to work
for a living, would he be thought any more of by
his fellow work-men than any ordinary man? cer-
tainly not. Take the son of a lord, or any one of
known respectability, even if Providence poverized
him for a time he still held his social station. We
make this parallel, because we have authority for
placing the Irish people in the position of the lat-
ter assumed instance and their oppressors in the
former. Hence, every Irishman who is not lost
to national self-respect will assist in the preserva-
tion of his native language,
The GAEL costs sixty cents a year, five cents a
month, or say, a cent a week. The elevation of the
Irish race is its object; it commences at the root
of nationality, and it should find its way into the
library of every Irishman. It rests with the Ir-
ish race to enlarge and improve it. We are do-
ing all in our power.
"NO RENT” IN THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND. —
An extraordinary scene has taken place on the estate
of Lord Macdonald, at Wortree, in the Isle Skye.
The tenants of Blameanach, Peinchoran and Gedeu-
taillear have refused to pay rent. As there was
no prospect of their doing so, his lordship res-
olved to put law into force. A short time ago a
sheriff's officer, accompanied by another official
was instructed to serve summonses on some twenty
or more refractory tenents. For some time back a
regular system of watching the holdings by senti-
nels has been adopted to give warning of the appro-
ach of strangers, and when the party-made their
appearance the people of the neighborhood were
immediately summoned, about 200 responding to
call. Upon the sheriff’s officer making known his
errand he was siezed, and the summonses taken
from him and burned before his eyes. He was
then cooly told to return where he came from, or
it would be the worst for him. The agitation is
spreading rapidly, and assuming alarming propor-
tions.
Send sixty cents for the Gaodhal.
