Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 1.djvu/223

 the Highland Society of Scotland. Above all things the ancient dialects ought to be systematised and preserved, as their importance is incalculable for the purposes of comparative philology.

"We are to have another Tenant-Right Meeting on Wednesday, but it will be a business rather than an oratorical assemblage.—I am, dear Duffy, with sincere regard, very truly yours, "."

When help through the Council became hopeless we fell back on the Confederation, and counselled the farmers to hold their harvests till the wants of their families were supplied. The harvest grown on the farm ought to feed the cultivator before the landlord or the State had any claim. If a universal determination to uphold this right sprang up it would become altogether irresistible. I will merely quote extracts from two speeches delivered on the same day; those who need ampler details know where to find them. At a meeting of the Confederation held in April, Mitchel, who was chairman, put the case in a nutshell:—

"If Ireland yields produce enough to feed eight millions, what particular eight millions in the world have the first claim upon it? Now, it is fit that it should be known there are in Ireland some men at least who would solve that question in favour of the eight Irish millions, and who, if those same millions happen to be of that opinion too, will help them to make it good."

In moving the first resolution I developed this thesis in the plainest language I could employ:—

"England at this hour is teeming with wealth and plenty, yet it is not alleged that she possesses any natural advantages which we do not share. England does not starve. Her people do not die in myriads, or fly with averted eyes from her shore. Has our land no natural rights? Is there some ordinance of God by which we, living in the same latitude and under the same skies, must see our people die of hunger and nakedness! Let us not blaspheme Providence; let us not even blame England; the fault is not England's, but our own. It is the right of this Irish people, and their sacred