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Louise Imogen Guiney, ed., James Clarence Mangan: Selected Poems (1897)
Note on “Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan”.
[Source: James Clarence Mangan: Selected Poems of James Clarence Mangan, with a Study by Louise Imogen Guiney (London: John Lane; NY & Boston: available online - accessed 23.11.2012.]
Note 13 (to the poem on pp.173-74)—
| Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan and all the poems which follow, in this division, except the Dirge for O’Sullivan Beare, are relics of the Jacobite insurrections, chiefly of the immortal ’45. “The King’s son” is, of course, Prince Charles Edward. “The Irish Jacobites claimed the Stuarts as of the Milesian line, fondly deducing them from Fergus.” The popular lyrics of that day, which were written in Ire-land, in the English tongue, have the tang of novelty and wildness, but lack, in many instances, the odd exquisite ten-derness of Shule Aroon and The Blackbird. As in Scotland, some of the sweetest of the Jacobite lyrics date from a generation [346] or more after the event; so nothing written under the Georges, who hated “boets,” [sic] is so good an English poem out of Ireland as its modern successors: Callanan’s spirited Avenger, or The Wild Geese, and a few other lyrics of Katharine Tynan (Mrs. Hinkson). The Gaelic compositions of the loyalists were very much more numerous, and of superior quality. Mangan translated a great many, among which I have endeavored to choose the best. They cannot for a moment, however, be compared to the simpler, briefer songs floating contemporaneously about the Highlands of Scotland. Mr. Edward Hayes, in the introduction to his collected Ballads of Ireland, remarks: “The poets of the last century looked forward more to a religious than to a political deliverer, whence their effusions were more dynastic than national, more Jacobite than Irish. When they sang of Ireland, it was in connection with the fallen dynasty. They longed for the union of Una and Donald, in other words, Ireland and the Stuart. They addressed their country as a beloved female, to disguise the object of their affection. Sometimes it was Sabia from Brian Boru’s daughter of that name; sometimes it was Sheela Ni Guira, or Cecilia O’Gara; Maureen Ni Collenan, Kathleen Ny Houlahan, Roseen Dhuv; more frequently Granu Weal, or Grace O’Malley, from a princess of Connaught who rendered herself famous by her exploits and adventures. The poet beheld his beloved in a vision, and wandering in remote places, bewailed the suffering of his country. He rests himself beneath the shade of forest trees, and seeks refuge from his thoughts in calm repose. There appears to his rapt fancy one of those beautiful creatures we have named. Language is not sufficiently copious to de-scribe all her charms. He addresses her, and asks her if she be one of the fair divinities of old, or an angel from heaven to brighten his pathway through life and restore peace to his afflicted country. She replies that she is Erin of the Sorrows, once a queen, but now a slave. After she enumerates all the [347] wrongs and iniquities which she is enduring, she prophesies the dawn of a brighter day, when her exiled lord shall be restored to his rightful inheritance. This was the style adopted by most of the Jacobite poets of the last century, to express the sufferings of their country and their hope of deliverance from oppression. We question if imagination could originate a style of song more pathetic in its allusions or more powerful in its results.” |
| Not every one will agree with Mr. Hayes’ estimate. The allegorical style surely seems to readers of to-day a most mistaken, far-fetched, and ineffective device. It led to indescribable sameness and conventionality, exactly what was to be expected of the curious brood of pedants who gave Ireland her Delia Cruscan eighteenth-century literature. Says Mrs. Hinkson very neatly, in her preface to Irish Love Songs: “Some of these were laborers, some peddlers, some hedge-schoolmasters, all alike touched with genius, wit, fire, and learning (for it was a time when the Irish peasant had the dead languages at his fingers’ ends); all alike scamps, in a simple and virtuous age, and adding to their scampishness a Voltairean spirit much out of its due time and place.” Scotland had also her lesser dash of pseudo- classicism, which went far towards ruining some of her invaluable Prince Charlie songs. Of “the lad that I’ll gang wi’”, the romantic lad with “phillabeg aboon the knee,” we are told in almost the next breath that “you’d tak him for the god o’ war.” In Egan O’Rahilly’s Vision, rendered by Mangan, who reported only what he found, the distressed virgin, the Brightest of the Bright, has crystals for eyes, a mirror for a bosom, crimson glories for cheeks; and she looked, as was inevitable, like “a daughter of the Celestial Powers.” There is no “highfalutin” of this sort in Kathaleen Ny-Houlahan. The ballads under that name are almost as good as the group entitled Roisin Dubh, which are a century and a half earlier. From John Mitchel we [348] receive an explanatory passage regarding them, and Mangan’s felicitous handling of them. “In these translations, as well as those from the German, Mangan did not assume to be literal in words and phrases. Nor, indeed, in general, was there any uniform unvarying version of the original poems, to which he could be literal, because they lived, for the most part, only in the memories of the illiterate peasantry; and Gaelic scholars, in their researches for authentic originals, usually found three or four different ballads, on the same subject and under the same name, having some lines and verses identical, but varying in the arrangement; always, however, agreeing in cadence and rhythm, in general scope and spirit. To this scope and spirit he was always faithful.” Here is a second Kathaleen, from our translator’s pen, in The Poets and Poetry of Munister: |
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In vain, in vain we turn to Spain: she heeds us not,
Yet may we still, by strength of will, amend our lot;
O yes! our foe shall yet lie low; our swords are drawn
For her, our queen, our Caitilin Ny Uallachain.
Yield not to fear: the time is near. With sword in hand
We soon will chase the Saxon race far from our land.
What glory then to stand as men on field and bawn
And see, all sheen, our Caitilin Ny Uallachain!
How tossed, how lost, with hopes all crossed we long have been!
Our gold is gone; gear have we none, as all have seen.
But ships shall brave the ocean wave, and morn shall dawn
On Eire green, on Caitilin Ny Uallachain!
Let none believe this lovely Eve outworn or old;
Fair is her form, her blood is warm, her heart is bold.
Tho’ strangers long have wrought her wrong, she will not fawn,
Will not prove mean, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain!
Her stately air, her flowing hair, her eyes that far
Pierce thro’ the gloom of Banba’s doom, each like a star;
Her songful voice that makes rejoice hearts grief hath gnawn,
Prove her our queen, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain! [349]
We will not bear the chains we wear, not bear them long!
We seem bereaven, but mighty heaven will make us strong:
The God who led thro’ Ocean Red all Israel on,
Will aid our queen, our Caitilin Ni Uallachain!
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| A word as to Ny-Houlahan. “Ny” is the correct Gaelic substitute, in a female name, for the tribal “Mac”or “O”. As Mr. Conor MacSweeny reminds his countrywomen: “A lady who writes ‘O’ or ‘Mac’ to her name calls herself ‘son’ instead of daughter.’ What should we say of a Hebrew lady who would write herself ‘Esther, son of Judah?’ I therefore advise every Irish lady to substitute ‘ Ni’ (pronounced ‘Nee’) for ‘O’ or ‘Mac.’ ... In Irish we never use ‘O’ or ‘Mac’ with a woman’s name; and why must it be done in English?” |
| Among the love-names for Ireland just quoted from Hayes’ Ballads are several which have been from the beginning associated with the most beautiful wild old airs: notably Moirin Ni Chuillionain (Little Mary Cullenan) and Sighile Ni Gara (Celia O’Gara). To the second version of Roisin, quoted in the introduction to this book, “Since last night’s star,” &c., belongs also a strangely lovely air in A minor, full of rushing sixteenth notes, which may be found, unharmonized, in The Poets and Poetry of Munster. “The Silk o’ the Kine”, one of the most touching phrases on the lips of the Irish of bygone rebellion, has been exquisitely celebrated by Mr. Aubrey de Vere. |
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“The silk of the kine shall rest at last:
What drove her forth but the dragon-fly?
In the golden vale she shall feed full fast,
With her mild gold horn, and her slow dark eye.”
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| There is no “genuine” Irish Jacobite poetry more quiet, tender, and convincing than that. (pp.346-49.) |
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[See also Mangan’s original footnote: ‘Anglice, Catherine O’Holohan, a name by which Ireland was allegorically known” p.173.] |
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