Quotes from Seumas MacManus

Many a man's tongue broke his nose.

In a dreadful storm that the supposedly wizard De Danann raised up against them, when they attempted to land in Ireland, five of the sons of Milesius, with great numbers of their followers, were lost, their fleet was dispersed and it seemed for a time as if none of them would ever enjoy the Isle of Destiny. Ancient manuscripts preserve the prayer that, it is said, their poet, Amergin, now prayed for them

One queen, famous and capable, whom early Ireland boasted was Macha Mong Ruad (the Red-haired), who reigned over the land about three hundred years before Christ.

The fact that in such remote tune as the fifth century a woman could command the respect, the reverence, and moral obedience which were so fully and freely rendered to Bridget will naturally surprise the many who reflect that in most countries it is only a few centuries since women came out of semi-bondage. But, in Ireland, from the remotest time of which we have any record, historical or legendary, woman stood emancipated, and was oftentimes eligible for the professions, and for rank and fame.

Dr. Atkinson thinks it was as far away as two thousand years ago that the Irish began to grace their then ancient poetic art with their new Invention of rhyme. From the Latin verses of Colm and other earliest Irish saints, we have positive proof that, anyhow, rhyme was in use in Ireland in the very earliest Christian times — both vowel rhyme (assonance) and consonantal rhyme called comharda.

The first English poet to use rhyme — in his Latin verse — was Aldhelm, in the eighth century, who, it will be noted, was a pupil of the Irish monk, Mael-dubh, whose school was on the site of the present English city of Malmesbury.

The sixteenth-century scholar, O'Flaherty, fixes the Milesian invasion of Ireland at about 1000 B. C. — the time of Solomon.

When, after they had long sojourned in Spain, they heard of Ireland (perhaps from Phoenician traders) and took it to be the Isle of Destiny, foretold for them by Moses, their leader was Miled or Milesius, whose wife also was a Pharaoh's daughter, and named Scota.

Miled having died in Spain, his eight sons, with their mother, Scota, their families and followers, at length set out on their venturous voyage to their Isle of Destiny.

In answer to them, the youth, standing up in the Hall of Heroes, with spear in one hand, and shield in the other, exclaimed: "I care not whether I die to-morrow or next year, if only my deeds live after me.

When Cimbaoth died this able woman took up the reins of government herself, becoming the first Milesian queen of Ireland. But the record above all others by which this distinguished woman lives to fame. is her founding of the ancient and much-storied stronghold — named after her — of Emain Macha, which henceforth, for six hundred years, was to play a most important part in the fortunes of Uladh (Ulster) and of Ireland. Macha's

Macha's foster-son, Ugani Mor (the Great), who succeeded her, led his armies into Britain, and had his power acknowledged there.

The great Irish historiographer, Eugene O'Curry, says: "The De Danann were a people remarkable for their knowledge of the domestic, if not the higher, arts of civilized life

Cuchullain died as a hero should — on a battlefield, with his back to a rock and his face to the foe, buckler on arm, and spear in hand. He died standing, and in that defiant attitude (supported by the rock) was many days dead ere the enemy dared venture near enough to reassure themselves of his exit — which they only did when they saw the vultures alight upon him, and, undisturbed, peck at his flesh.

On top of the mountain of Croagh Patrick in Connaught, he spent the forty days of Lent, watching, and fasting, and praying. And the tradition goes, as recorded by the Monk Jocelin that it was from this mountaintop he commanded all the serpents and venomous things in Ireland, driving them into the ocean, and ridding Ireland of all viperous things forever.[40

Some noted Continental scholars such as Zeuss and Nigra, agree with leading Irish authorities that it was the ancient Irish who invented rhyme — and introduced it, through the Latin, to the countries of Europe.

The Irish Race of to-day is popularly known as the Milesian Race, because the genuine Irish (Celtic) people were supposed to be descended from Milesius of Spain, whose sons, say the legendary accounts, invaded and possessed themselves of Ireland a thousand years before Christ.[1] But

Irish records say that Crimthann the Great reigned over Britain (meaning, of course, a chief part of Britain) for 13 years, from 366 to 379.

But it is nearly as inaccurate to style the Irish people pure Milesian because the land was conquered and settled by the Milesians, as it would be to call them Anglo-Norman because it was conquered and settled by the twelfth century English.

It is difficult for us to realise that in the ancient Irish Schools of Poets the students were trained in not less than three hundred and fifty different kinds of metre.

The Races that occupied the land when the so-called Milesians came, chiefly the Firbolg and the Tuatha De Danann,[2] were certainly not exterminated by the conquering Milesians. Those two peoples formed the basis of the future population, which was dominated and guided, and had its characteristics moulded, by the far less numerous but more powerful Milesian aristocracy and soldiery.

All three of these races, however, were different tribes of the great Celtic family, who, long ages before, had separated from the main stem, and in course of later centuries blended again into one tribe of Gaels — three derivatives of one stream, which, after winding their several ways across Europe from the East, in Ireland turbulently met, and after eddying, and surging tumultuously, finally blended in amity, and flowed onward in one great Gaelic stream.

Of these three certain colonisations of Ireland, the Firbolg was the first. Legend says they came from Greece, where they had been long enslaved, and whence they escaped in the captured ships of their masters.

In their possession of Ireland the Firbolgs were disturbed by the descents and depredations of African sea-rovers, the Fomorians, who had a main stronghold on Tory Island, off the Northwest Coast. But