Page 26 - Demo

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Stephen Dunford: The Journey of The IrIsh
As though in that deep lay emerald mines Whose light through the wave was seen. “’Tis Inisfáil --- ‘tis Inisfáil!”
Rings o’er the echoing sea;
While bending to heaven, the warriors hail That home of the brave and free.
Then turned they unto the Eastern wave Where now their Day-God’s eye
A look of such sunny omen gave
As lighted up sea and sky.
No frown was seen through sky or sea, Nor tear o’er leaf or sod,
When first on their Isle of Destiny Our great forefathers trod.
Whatever credence can be placed in the information gleaned from the legends concern- ing the peoples of the Stone Age and Bronze Age in Ireland, it is at least certain that the country was inhabited during these periods; because the stones, the soil, the very surface of the land itself, have all preserved evidence to prove this.
However, for the purposes of this narrative, our interest in the peoples of those remote times must now come to an end, and we must instead concentrate on the more recent peo- ple of the Iron Age: those tall, blonde, blue-eyed people of generous manners whose lan- guage was the original form of the language which today we call Gaedhilg/Gaelic, or Irish, that skilled race who excelled especially in agriculture, and who became ancestors of the greater part of the Irish Nation-the Celts.
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