LITMIR.BIZ

      Patrick Street, Dublin, looking north, c.1895. McCall’s tavern is on the left (National Library of Ireland [L_ROY_05934]).

      When he was fourteen, Griffith won copies of two books of Irish songs and ballads. They were awarded for his attendance and performance at Irish history classes of the Young Ireland Society, and were presented to him by the society’s president, veteran Fenian John O’Leary. According to a contemporary report, the books were Barry’s Songs of Ireland and a collection of ballads and poetry by ‘Duncathail’.6 On that day, O’Leary urged the rising generation to seek the ideal of Thomas Davis, whom Griffith was long to champion. It had been intended that Davis would, had he lived longer, edit the volume of ballads that Barry actually edited and that was first published in 1845. Barry, of whose collection Griffith now had a prize copy, informed readers that he ‘of course, rejected those songs which were un-Irish in their character or language, and those miserable slang productions, which, representing the Irishman only as a blunderer, a bully, a fortune-hunter, or a drunkard, have done more than anything else to degrade him in the eyes of others, and, far worse to debase him in his own’.7 Barry, like many other nationalists in the nineteenth century, contended with the stage-Irishman, with ‘humourous’ or other representations of his countrymen that were not merely a matter for literary critics to address. For, together with some cartoons in Punch magazine that represented Irish people as ape-like, such stereotypes served to pander to prejudice and imperialism.

      Young Ireland had utilised ballads and song as a means of protesting and of galvanising support, and the Fenians of 1867 did likewise.8 In 1889 Griffith, aged eighteen, read to the Leinster Debating Club a short but entertaining paper on the topic.9 One striking feature of it was that the first and oldest ballad he cited was not nationalist in sentiment. He used this to make a point about street ballads generally:

      Their influence at times has been remarkable. For instance, a ballad written by a noble lord in James II’s reign is said to have contributed not a little to his overthrow [by King William of Orange] – here is a verse:

      There was an old prophecy found in a bog

      Lillabulera Ballera la!

      That Ireland would be ruled by an ass and a dog

      Lillabulera Ballera la!

      And now this old prophecy has come to pass

      Lillabulera Ballera la!

      For Talbot’s the dog and King James is the ass

      Lillabulera Ballera la!

      Griffith was quoting a song that became widely known before the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, and that his Ulster Protestant ancestors may well have sung. ‘Lillabulera’ (also ‘Lilliburlero’) is thought to have played a significant role in eroding public support for King James II. Its satirical, taunting lyrics were put to an old jig that Henry Purcell arranged and were sung by the supporters of ‘King Billy’. Its words were written in 1688 by Thomas Wharton, later a lord lieutenant of Ireland, and they satirised sentiments of the Catholic Irish that were then being voiced by royalist balladeers. Its opening line sets the tone: ‘Ho! Broder [brother] Teague, dost hear de decree?’ As seen above, the ballad has a sting in the tail for King James and his lord deputy Richard Talbot, earl of Tyrconnell (there was then a breed of dog used for tracking, especially on the battlefield, that was known as a Talbot). The refrain of the song may be an anglicised version of Irish words, perhaps ‘Lilly ba léir dó, ba linn an lá’ meaning ‘Lilly foretold it, this day would come.’ William Lilly (1602–81) was an immensely popular English astrologer.10 The air is played, to this day, by Orange bands, although with different lyrics and known as ‘The Protestant Boys’. A version of it also long served as the signature tune of the BBC World Service, despite the poet Robert Graves objecting to it.11 Such was its significance in Ireland under the Stuarts, that Bagwell equated its effect to that of The Marriage of Figaro in France before the French revolution and of John Brown’s March in the American civil war.12 It was said that forty thousand copies were circulated by the end of the 1680s and that the taking of Carrickfergus and the crossing of the Boyne were accompanied by the playing of it.13 It was not usually sung by nationalists.

      As an editor, Griffith promoted the recovery and playing of Irish music and airs. His taste encompassed all sorts of ballads that he picked up on the streets. Any suggestion that Griffith was solely interested in the political content of his papers, while others took care of cultural or literary matters in them, is far too reductionist. Soon after Griffith’s death, George Lyons wrote ‘Among the most important and most beautiful achievements of Griffith was his “Ballad History of Ireland” which ran through the pages of The United Irishman from January 1904 till February 1905.’ Griffith’s brother Frank claimed that Brown’s Historical Ballad Poetry of Ireland was a ‘piece of piracy’ of Griffith’s work in the United Irishman.14 Griffith’s series was by no means all that he published on the topic of ballads, or on music more generally, and his body of work in that and other respects awaits further attention.15

      Griffith’s friend William Rooney went to great lengths until his early death to find and have sung as many old Irish songs as he could discover, and Griffith kept up a campaign in support of Irish compositions and airs. As always, Griffith’s objective was to reinforce national self-esteem and to develop Irish economic and cultural activity. It is evident from reading his pieces in the United Irishman that he believed that some ostensibly highly cultured people patronised or scorned what was indigenous, and he would have none of it. On St John’s Eve 1910 young nationalist people gathered in Donnycarney near Dublin to celebrate midsummer, consciously adopting what they understood to be traditional customs of the old Irish on such special occasions. These included jumping over bonfires, which was perhaps once a fertility rite. They also sang popular nationalist songs, including ‘God Save Ireland’, ‘The Memory of the Dead’, ‘The Green Flag’ and ‘poor Fear na Muintear’s [the late William Rooney’s] “Men of the West”’. The United Irishman reported ‘we thought of the dark days of ten or twelve years ago, when William Rooney and his little band of comrades were sneered and jibed at as foolish dreamers and mad enthusiasts by the “practical men”’.16 James Joyce remembered a quieter visit to the same district:

      O, it was out by Donnycarney

      When the bat flew from tree to tree

      My love and I did walk together;

      And sweet were the words she said to me.17

      Griffith’s private secretary during the treaty negotiations in London wrote that ‘Griffith liked good music, and had a sweet, weak singing voice … He liked patriotic love songs such as The Foggy Dew or Maire my Girl’.18 Interned with him in England, a future minister for finance, Ernest Blythe, discovered that ‘Griffith had an extraordinary knowledge of Irish music. No matter what tune was mentioned in any discussion he was able to whistle it. He must have had at least hundreds of tunes in his mind.’19 Griffith also liked arias

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