United States or Marshall Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
It is often claimed that an Irishman is merely an inferior kind of Englishman, and that there is little difference in blood between the two; but those who make this claim most loudly would not dream of denying the difference of the mental types; they are generally the ones who see most difference. Why was it that the children of the Norman invaders of Ireland became Hiberniores ipsis Hiberniis?
In fact, matters progressed so favorably in this friendly direction, that at length the descendants of Strongbow and his followers became, as is well known, "Hibernis Hiberniores," and the judges sent from England could hold their circuit only in the four counties between the Liffey and the Boyne; and the name given to the majority of the old English families was "English rebels," while the natives were called "Irish enemies."
The great families, Irish or Norman the latter having long before become Hibernis ipsis Hiberniores had either conformed to the ruling faith or had betaken themselves to more friendly shores, or, having lost their estates by confiscation or treachery, had become confounded with the oppressed and suffering multitude.
Noble Normans sunk into savages Hibernis ipsis hiberniores! Is there some uncivilizing venom in the air?" "Some venom, at least, which makes English men traitors. But the Irish themselves are well enough, if their tyrants would let them be.
In England, the last consideration of a noble-minded man was his personal advantage; Ireland was a theatre for a universal scramble of selfishness, and the invaders caught the national contagion, and became, as the phrase went, ipsis Hibernis Hiberniores.
Should they show the slightest desire of combining with the majority of their countrymen, these latter will be generous enough to forget the past, and perhaps the others may imitate their predecessors, the Danes, the Normans, and even some of their Cromwellian kin, and become, at last, Hibernis hiberniores.
Word Of The Day