Begone! to swell the Jingo train and ape
the tricks of Tories:
Let Rosebery share with Chamberlain his
cheap Imperial glories:
Let Primrose Leaguers’ base applause
to Duty’s promptings blind you—
Desert an outraged nation’s cause,
and take this curse behind you;—
Expect your doom, ye Liberals! though
now you scorn and flout us,
Full soon within St Stephen’s walls
you’ll fare but ill without us;
No more to us for succour come, for when
you most would have it,
It will not be forthcoming from yours
truly, MICHAEL DAVITT!
THE TRUE REMEDY (1898)
The angry Gael to sooth you’ll fail—the
wrongs he lays your door at
It won’t redress to pay his cess
and nearly all his poor rate:
’Tis useless quite to calm his spite
by show’ring blessings o’er him,
While still he lacks the O’s and
Macs his fathers had before him!
But now, to close the tale of woes which
long had tried our patience,
Great MacAleese cements a peace between
the warring nations;
No more the swords of Saxon hordes are
rankling in our vitals,
For Erin’s shore enjoys once more
her ancient styles and titles.
O long ago had things been so ere feud
had rent our party,
And Parnell those for leader chose while
these preferred McCarthy,
I doubt not but the Cause had cut a fat
superior figure,
If, better led, we’d had for head
O’Parnell and MacBiggar!
’Twas hard to spot the patriot when
parties mingled freely,
And Labouchere at times would share the
politics of Healy;
A symbol new and plain to view from such
mistakes will free him—
By Mac and O you’ll always know
a patriot when you see him:
This shibboleth shall bind till death,
without respect of faction,
In mutual love, all persons of Hibernian
extraction:
I see them stand, a gallant band, agreed
each question vexed on,
O’Saunderson in heart at one with
Dillon and MacSexton!
And when we’ve found Home Rule All
Round the only panacea,
The Welsh perhaps will all be Aps—the
Scotchmen Macs as we are—
While Englishmen will sorrow then, in
shame and degradation,
To think they’ve not the titles
got which really make a Nation.
UNITED IRELAND
“Here’s your fery good health,
And tamn ta Whuskey Duty!”
Though Hibernians for long in dissension
have dwelt
(As a dog that resides with
a cat),
There’s a bond that the Saxon allies
to the Celt—
They are perfectly solid on
that!
And if ever their union is marred by a
flaw,
It is due to the craven who
shrinks
From proclaiming aloud the immutable law,
That he ought not to pay for
his drinks.