These are some of the songs the Irish sing in these days of weary agitation and Sinn fein Outrage. In_''Macpherson's Lament" (Air—"Wearin' 0' the Green"), the minstrel aneets the Chief Seeretary an' he took me by the hand, Sez ho "Those Yankee delegates, T'd like to see them damned." Bad luck be on the day they came into this island green, Tis the worse thing ever happened since the year 1916.
Of course the marching chorus of the Volunteers' "A Soldier's Song"—'Soldiers are we whose lives are pledged to Ireland, Sworn to be free, no more our ancient ireland Shall shelter the despot or the slave"—is included in the collection, with such ancient and modern classics as The Felons of Our Land." "Wran the Green Flag round me," and—"WWho fears to speak of Easter Week, Who dares its fate deplore? The ved-gold flame of Erin's name Confronts the world once more." The general spirit is well represented in this verse, to be sung to the popular tune: "Let Erin remember the days of old"
Let Erin remember Easter Week and her faithful sons who saved her,; 2 With pride in our voice their names we speak and scorn for the ruthless invader "By our Martyred Dead''—to this pledge we stand. As we vow let each head uncover, To free our land from the rufian band, nor rest till the fight is over.
There is considerable beauty in some verses on Thomas Ashe, who died in prison after a hunger atrike:—To your soul for awhile we all murmur farewell!
And we take the dear gift that you gave, For your great life stamped out in the cold prison cell, Shall be potent our own lavish nature to save.
The' your body we leave in the drear, hidden gloom of the grave.
But the humour of "A Mountjoy Ditty," treating of the famous prison-breaking incident, is at least equally characteristic J. J. Walsh and Pierce Beasley the trick did quite easily, Some pro-German devil a ladder did throw; Then some twenty Sinn Feiners like acrobat trainers, Scaled the wall and got free, all Alive, Alive O!
We know what has been wisely said about the making of the songs of a people. There are hundreds of such songs as these being sung in the homes of the common people of Ireland to-day.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.