Page:Irish essays; literary and historical.pdf/27

 the castles of its spoilers will have become nameless barrows. We may well re-echo the touching prayer of Brother Michael for the welfare of his soul:—

Neither should we forget those younger Masters, who have lately passed away, by whose labours those who are strangers to the ancestral tongue of Erin are enabled to profit by the writings of Brother Michael and his associates. Foremost amongst them stands the ever-honoured name of John O’Donovan, who has translated and annotated the Annals of the Four Masters, and thus made that great work accessible to the whole English-speaking world. It was a task requiring great learning and immense labour; and, according to the confession of all, it has been most successfully accomplished. His name will go down to posterity, and most fitly so, bracketed for ever with the immortal Masters of Donegal. Eugene O'Curry also, and Petrie, with Todd and Hardiman, gave most valuable assistance to O’Donovan in accomplishing this great work.

It was O'Curry who transcribed for the press in his own beautiful style the autograph copy of the Four Masters, and also gave most effective help by explaining, as perhaps he alone could do, ancient and obsolete words in the text. Petrie, to whom in other respects Irish literature is so much indebted, read the sheets as they passed through the press—itself a work of very great labour—and gave useful help in many other ways also. Todd and Hardiman likewise lent their assistance; the former especially, for he spared neither his labour nor his purse in order to bring the work to a successful issue. The publisher, too, Mr. George Smyth, who at his own sole risk undertook this vast work, certainly deserves his meed of praise for making the Four Masters accessible to the literary world. We should never forget the ungrudging labours of those great men in the cause of Irish literature; and, certainly, their example should not be without its effect in moving us to do something, each in his own way, be it great or small, to forward the same glorious work.