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Permission to use Heritage History documents or images for commercial purposes, or more information about our collection of traditional history resources can be obtained by contacting us at [email protected] Original Copyright 1911 by Alice Birkhead. 2 Distributed by Heritage History 2010 TABLE OF CONTENTS THE LAND OF GREAT LEGEND ......................................................... 4 ANCIENT DWELLERS IN ERIN ........................................................... 6 THE RULE OF THE SAINTS ................................................................ 8 THE COMING OF THE LAND-LEAPERS ........................................... 10 THE MARRIAGE OF STRONGBOW ................................................... 13 EDWARD BRUCE, KING OF IRELAND .............................................. 15 ART MACMORROGH, KING OF LEINSTER ...................................... 16 GERALD, EARL OF KILDARE .......................................................... 18 SHANE THE PROUD, HERO OF THE NORTH .................................... 20 SIR JAMES FITZMAURICE, REBEL .................................................. 22 MR SECRETARY SPENSER ............................................................... 24 ANOTHER VIEW OF THE STATE OF IRELAND ................................. 27 THE FLIGHT OF THE EARLS ............................................................ 28 THE COLONIZATION OF ULSTER .................................................... 30 THE SCOURGE OF WENTWORTH .................................................... 32 OWEN ROE O'NEILL, PATRIOT ...................................................... 34 THE CURSE OF CROMWELL ............................................................ 36 THE BATTLE OF THE BOYNE .......................................................... 39 PATRICK SARSFIELD, DEFENDER OF LIMERICK ............................ 41 DEAN SWIFT, "THE MOST POPULAR MAN IN IRELAND" .............. 44 THE SOCIETY OF UNITED IRISHMEN .............................................. 46 THE REBELLION OF '98 ................................................................... 48 THE UNION ...................................................................................... 50 DANIEL O'CONNELL, LIBERATOR .................................................. 53 THE GREAT HUNGER ...................................................................... 55 THOMAS MOORE, "THE POET OF THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND" ...... 57 THE FENIAN BROTHERHOOD .......................................................... 59 THE CASE OF CAPTAIN BOYCOTT .................................................. 62 HOME RULE FOR IRELAND ............................................................. 64 MAP OF IRELAND. Original Copyright 1911 by Alice Birkhead. 3 Distributed by Heritage History 2010 CHAPTER I Disaster fell upon the brave sons of Usnach—Naoisi, Ainle, and Ardan—through Deirdre, the daughter of the king's tale-teller. Very beautiful was Deirdre, but she was sad and THE LAND OF GREAT LEGEND lonely as a child, because she was not allowed to play with the ether children of the court, but must watch their games from Ireland has always been a land of heroes, but, in far-off afar. Dire misfortune was foretold when Deirdre was born, and days, these were not real men of flesh, and blood. They were it was useless to try to avert this prophecy. From her window giants of such mighty size that stories of their deeds must she saw Naoisi, and straightway loved him for the beauty of needs be greater than any stories of mere men. Even after his brown-black hair and his white skin, which resembled the countless ages, it is still related how they loved and hated, driven snow. At night Naoisi visited Deirdre secretly, and, lived and fought. Traces of their presence can be found in all loving her in return, entreated her to fly with him to Alba that the regions where they dwelt, and in the wild North-country they might escape King Cormac's wrath. Accompanied by one some have left us everlasting tokens lest we should perhaps hundred warriors, they left their own land and dwelt in a far hear and not believe. There, where Ireland confronts Scotland, country, till one day, as they played a game of chess, through the shadowy mists you can see the marvellous messengers came to bid the sons of Usnach return to Erin. Causeway, built to allow a Scotch giant passage from one land Deirdre warned her husband in vain that the king meant to the other, and not many miles away lies beautiful Lough treachery by his summons. They returned to Emania, and all Neagh, made by Fionn MacCoul as he pursued an enemy in the three sons of Usnach were slain together, and Deirdre, rage, and seized a portion of the earth to hurl after him, and let singing first a mournful lament over their dead bodies, threw loose, where the earth had been, a flood of mighty waters, now herself into the same grave and died with her arms about formed into a lake. Naoisi. The stories of ancient Ireland are tragic in their theme. The children of Lir were the daughter and three sons of The best known of them all are the Three Sorrows—The Fate a famous king. When their own mother died, Eva, the second of the Children of Usnach, The Fate of the Children of Lir, and wife of Lir, used them very cruelly, and turned them into white The Fate of the Children of Turenn. swans; for she was an enchantress, and with her wand could The children of Usnach dwelt with King Cormac in his work all evil to those she did not love. She decreed that the great palace of Emania, where assembled warriors famed in swans should never regain their mortal shape till they heard annals of war, and poets who chanted their exploits, and the sound of Christian bells in Ireland. At first the swans sailed musicians who accompanied the lays of the poets on the harp. on the waters of Lake Darvra, and by day they spoke with the "The king's room was in the front of the house, and was long men of Erin, and at night they chanted fairy music with such enough for thirty warriors. It was ornamented with silver and sweetness that any who listened forgot all pain and grief. bronze, and carbuncles and precious stones, so that day and Then the swans were banished to the Sea of Moyle, night were equally light therein. A gong of silver hung behind which lies between Erin and distant Alba. Their hearts were the king, suspended from the roof-tree, and when he struck it wrung with anguish for the friends they saw no longer, and with his silver wand with three silver apples, all the men of they suffered cruel hardships from cold and hunger, frost and Ulster were silent." storm. At last the tale of years had wellnigh run, and the four Original Copyright 1911 by Alice Birkhead. 4 Distributed by Heritage History 2010 swans fled to the western sea and endured sore tribulation six parts of the "eric-fine." Then Luga chanced to hear there, till a saint came to the island and his bells rang faintly whispers of their strange success, and cast a spell over them, the sound of their release. Youth never was restored to them, so that they forgot the cooking-spit and the three shouts on and all three bore the marks of more than mortal age when Midkena's Hill. they entreated baptism and awaited the happier change of They returned only to set out on the quest again, and death. when the full "eric-fine" was paid, Luga felt a thrill of satisfied