AN GAODHAL.
﻿689
ity of our old mss., of O'Donovan, Keating and O'¬
Molloy for so doing. These authors cannot I hope
be classed among the merely book learned ; and
then, here is Father O’Sullivan, whose thorough
mastery of Irish idioms could only have been at¬
tained through a practical knowledge of the spok¬
en language — all going to prove that
dólfadh sé, dheunfadh sé, etc., are not
plants of recent grotwh used only of late by merely
book learned Philo-Celts, but that they have been
in use and approved by the best informed Irish
scholars and speakers for centuries past.
The ear, in this case, is a poor criterion. All
depends on whose ear listens, on what that ear has
been accustomed * to.
The Cockney's h ear h-aches at Saudy’s “Guid
day my bonnie chiel” and maks the Scot's earie
muckle suir in return; but the ear of neither, repels
the language of brother Scot or † (Cockney. Habit
is a tyrant, and the ear is as sensative to its rule as
is any other organ.
Neither is the absence of “difference in the pos¬
ition of the organs of speech when emitting the
sounds” representing the words you instance, a
proof that they should be similarly conjugated. Ap¬
ply the same test indiscriminately through the
whole range of Irish grammar and see what a havoc
you play in it. Or what would you say of me if
I asserted that because fans and mans leaps and
sheeps and houses and mouses, require a large degree
of similarity in the positions of the vocal organs,
respectively in enunciating them, they were all
equally correct plural forms? You would, doubt¬
less, say that any style of argument though plausi¬
ble, lacked cogency, and advise me that while fans
leaps and houses were correct plural forms, mans,
sheeps and mouses were considered very bad
grammar.
If you say that the latter form their correct plu¬
rals in an exceptional manner, I will reply that
when any two rules conflict, the one is the strong¬
est kind of an exception to the other; that we have
the highest authority for believing that
verbs like buail and soillsigh in regard
to the present issue come under conflicting rules,
and that you have no more right to abolish a rule,
or part thereof, from Irish grammar by the intro¬
duction of so novel a test of euphony, rhyme, or
whatever you may term it, than l would have for
the change in English grammar above indicated.
You are also mistaken in saying that the form
you advocate is in general use throughout all Ire¬
land. Such is not the case, I was born and lived
there twenty-three years, speaking Irish from my
cradle, and I can assure you that in all those
years I never heard such forms as
dheunóchadh, dóleóadh or bhuaileóchadh, spo¬
ken.
Nor was there a district in Ireland more intensely
Irish than was my native district. Only a mere
handful of the population spoke English; an in¬
terpreter was constantly employed at court; “the
clergy prayed and preached” in the old vernacular
and a large part of the school hours, was of neces¬
sity devoted to the translation of English into Irish
and vice versa, as otherwise the pupils could make
but little progress.
I, one day, asked a twelve year old boy, who read
in the second reader, to translate dandelion into I¬
rish, and received as reply, “madadh
ná luigheadh." He did not recognize, in
its English garb the familiar caisearbhán
but his father father had a dog named Dandy
and he thought the term had reference to the ca¬
nine in repose.
In 1871 I was in another school district in which
not a dozen men, all told, spoke English. The
teacher just newly arrived, requested a fifteen year.
old boy, to go and bring a live coal with which to
light the school-house fire. But the
boy only enquired: "Cadé tá tú 'rádh?
ní thuigim thú; labhair gaedhilig."
Now, strange to say, this same boy could read the
third book fluently, but he never heard anything but
Gaelic out of school, and as his former teacher had
neglected to teach him to translate, he had learned
to read his lessons only as boys learn the respons¬
es, to a priest, serving mass, and did not compre¬
hend the meaning of a word he uttered.
There is no better Irish spoken anywhere than
was spoken by those people, as for their absolute
ignorance of any other language, their's was not
corrupted by the introduction of words foreign to
it as is the case with the Irish spoken in many parts
of Ireland. And neither they nor any others I met
in Ireland use the form of conjugation you advocate
except under the conditions prescribed by the rule
quoted by Mr. O'Donnell of Villanova.
But even were your assertions true, your theory
would still be incorrect, if it conflicted with the
rules laid down by standard authorities. Author¬
ity alone, must decide this controversy. Simple
assertion or denial will not do. The issue lays be¬
tween the standard that has governed our language
for centuries, and the oral usages of to-day: and I
cannot see how any sensible man can reject the evi¬
dence of our ancient mss., and the authority of O'¬
Donovan, Keating, etc., and accept in their stead
the oral usages that may obtain to-day, among the
unsettled dwellers on the slopes of Croagh * Patrick
Sleive-na-mon or Bornesmore.
If authority is to decide you are certainly at a
disadvantage, as your opponents have in the above
authorities ; in Father O’Sullivan (the most gifted
of translators into Irish), and in the Philo-Celts of
to-day, who hotly assail your theory, an unbroken
chain of authority running through many centuries
to the present time.
Canon Bourke is the only grammarian of any
note, who sustains you. I yield to none in respect
for the person of the Rev. Canon, and in gratitude
for the impetus, his learning and patriotic labors
have given the present movement for the revival of
our old tongue. But I question his judgement and
conclusions on this point, and for the following rea¬
son; 1st, because he is at variance with our most
eminent authorities; 2nd, because habit, the asso¬
ciations of a life-time, may have influenced his
judgment, 3rdly, because he has shown himself lia¬
ble to radical changes of opinion, as is evidenced
in his change of base on the matter of our ancient
* Ears as well trained as yours have heard them.
† There is no parallel between igorance and the
choice of one of two concededly correct grammati-
cal terminations. It ought not be made.
* When Prof. Zimmer came in Germany to
learn the language it is to these very mountains
he weat for information. How stupid, to prefer
the "Slopes of Croagh Patrick,” the mountain
home of John McHale, to the fertile meadows of
the descendants of Cromwell’s buccaneers !
