I shall never enter this Institution, and particularly this theatre, without thinking of him, and the recollection of his friendship will always be one of my most cherished memories. With regard to Mrs. Tyndall, I fear that nothing we can say can prove any consolation to her now; but I hope the time may come when the sympathy of so many devoted friends may bring some comfort to her.

Dr. EDWARD FRANKLAND said: After a knowledge of, and a friendship with Tyndall extending over nearly half a century, I have, of course, formed very definite opinions of his character. I first met Tyndall in 1847, at Queenwood College, Hampshire, where, for the first time in any school in England, experimental science was taught. It was this which attracted both of us to that Institution, and led Tyndall, in the intervals of work, to embrace all possible opportunities of acquiring some knowledge of chemistry. He was bright, sociable, original and greatly in earnest, with a fund of enthusiasm and humour. His individuality was so strong that I have never known any one in the least like him. Fond of literature and a devoted student of Carlyle and Emerson, also of Fichte and Goethe through translations, his mind was then almost a complete blank concerning physical science in any form. He worked in my laboratory and I gave him lessons in chemistry; in return he taught me mathematics. We attended each other's lectures and became fast friends. Eighteen months later we migrated to the University of Marburg in Hesse Cassel to study chemistry under Bunsen, and here Tyndall acquired a fair knowledge of qualitative and quantitative analysis; but the advent of the young and enthusiastic Knoblauch, as professor extraordinary of physics at Marburg in 1849, diverted his attention from chemistry to physics, in which science he found more scope for his mathematical knowledge. From Knoblauch's laboratory he passed to that of Magnus in Berlin. On returning to England in 1852, he made the acquaintance of Bence Jones and Faraday, and became professor of natural philosophy in this Institution in the following year. You, Sir, have so lucidly and graphically described his subsequent career that there is no room for any observations of mine; except perhaps this, that, commencing the elementary study of experimental science at the age of 27, Tyndall stands almost, if not quite alone as regards the number and importance of his original investigations, and the brilliant position which he achieved in the course of the following forty years as an expounder of scientific truths.

Professor DEWAR also paid a touching tribute to the memory of Dr. Tyndall, who had been for many years his personal friend, and after referring to Tyndall's private life, he said: I have never seen such abject idolatry of life, sympathy, and care expended by any human being as that of Mrs. Tyndall for her husband. However sad the disaster which caused the death of the Professor, it ought to be some consolation to her to think how many times she had been

the means of prolonging his life. She is the noblest woman I have ever known.

The Resolution was spoken to by others, including Sir JOSEPH LISTER, Sir FREDERICK ABEL, LORD GRIMTHORPE, and Dr. J. H. GLADSTONE.

Upon the Chairman putting the Resolution the whole of the company rose, and the motion was adopted unanimously.

APR

LIBR

WEEKLY EVENING MEETING,

Friday, January 26, 1894.

BASIL WOODD SMITH, Esq. F.R.A.S. F.S.A.

in the Chair.

10 MAY 95 e-President,

ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES, Esq. M.A.

Old Irish Song.

LIBRARY

In the dim morning twilight of Ancient Erin, legend describes her Fileas, or musical bards, as constant attendants upon the king and chieftain.

As Mr. Alfred M. Williams, the American critic, picturesquely puts the tradition, "Surrounded by the Orsidigh, or instrumental musicians, who fulfilled the function of a modern military band, they watched his progress in battle for the purpose of describing his feats in arms, composed birthday odes and epithalamia, aroused the spirits of clansmen with war songs, and lamented the dead in the caoines, or keens, which are still heard in the wilder and more primitive regions of Ireland."

We must, of course, discount much of the legendary colour which enthusiasts like Walker take on trust. But this is the picture of the early Irish bard presented to us by the chroniclers. Amongst other privileges, he wore a tartan with only one shade of colour less than that upon the king's robe, and his assassination involved a bloodpenalty inferior only to the royal eric. But before attaining such high honours, he had to satisfy the moral requirements of "purity of hand, bright without wounding, purity of mouth without poisonous satire, purity of learning without reproach, purity as a husband in wedlock."

He had, moreover, to pass through a decidedly arduous courtship of the Muse before he was entitled to claim her favour; indeed, some writers go so far as to say that, like the patriarch, he had to serve seven years for her, committing to memory an almost incredible number of earlier compositions, and giving the closest study to the laws of verse, before he could become a poet on his own account.

When it is added that these laws of Irish verse, as finally formulated by the early Celtic professors, were the most complicated ever invented-not only limiting the sense within the stanza, but fixing the amount of alliteration and the number of syllables in each line, to say nothing of their assonantal requirements-we may well understand that although Early Irish verse may be granted, according to Professor Atkinson, to be the most perfectly harmonious combinations of sounds that the world has ever known, it must also be conceded VOL. XIV. (No. 88.)

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that Irish "direct metre " was the most difficult kind of verse under the sun-the despairing opinion of another leading Irish philologist.

Dr. Whitley Stoke's comment is "that in almost all the ancient Celtic poetry, substance is ruthlessly sacrificed to form, and the observance of the rigorous rules of metre seems regarded as an end in itself." The consequence of such an artificial system, combined with the high privileges of the bardic caste, resulted in the multiplication of minor parts to a degree which would have paralysed all Mr. Traill's efforts to keep pace with them, had he been a contemporary critic.

O'Curry quotes this droll account of their pecuniary dealings: "At this time we are told that the poets became more troublesome and importunate than ever. They were in the habit of travelling about the country in companies of thirty, composed of pupils and teachers, and each company had a silver pot, called the Pot of Avarice,' having chains of bronze attached to it by golden hooks. It was suspended from the points of the spears of nine of the company, which were thrust through the links at the other end of the chains. The reason that the pot was called the Pot of Avarice was because it was into it that whatever of gold or silver they received was put, and, whilst the poem was being chanted, the best nine musicians in the company played music round the pot. If their minstrelsy was well received, and adequately paid for, they left their blessing behind them in verse; if it was not, they satirised their audience in the most virulent terms of which their poetical vocabulary was capable; and, be it observed, that to the satire of an Irish bard, to whom there still clung in the popular belief the mystical attributes of the druid, there attached a fatal malignity."

At the time of the conversion of Ireland to the Christian faith, the bards were said to number a third of the male population, and in 590 A.D. a Synod was held at Drumkeat, by Aed, king of Ulster, which greatly reduced their forces. Indeed, such was the popular irritation against them, that had it not been for the friendly intervention of the statesman-poet, St. Columbkille, they would probably have been banished altogether.

The Filea, or bard, no doubt was a minstrel as well as a poet, in the first instance, but in the course of time there would appear to have been a further bardic differentiation, and we learn that perfection in the three Musical Feats, or three styles of playing, gave the dignity of Ollamh, or Doctor of Music, to the professors of the harp. Now what were the three Musical Feats? Here they are, well described in a weird old folk tale.

Lugh (the Tuatha da Danann king), and the Daghda (their great chief and druid), and Ogma (their bravest champion), followed the Fomorians and their leader from the battlefield of Moyturah, because they had carried off the Daghda's harper, Uaithne by name. The pursuers reached the banqueting house of the Fomorian chiefs, and there found Breas, the son of Elathan, and Elathan the son of

Delbath, and also the Daghda's harp hanging upon the wall. This was the harp in which the music was spell-bound, so that it would not answer, when called forth, until the Daghda evoked it, when he said: "Come, Durdabla; come, Coircethairchuir (the two names of the harp). Come, Samhan; come, Camh, from the mouths of harps and pouches and pipes. The harp came forth from the wall then, and killed nine persons in its passage; and it came to the Daghda, and he played for them the three musical feats which give distinction to a harper, viz., the Suantree (which, from its deep murmuring, caused sleep), the Gauntree (which, from its merriment, caused laughter), and the Golltree (which, from its melting plaintiveness, caused crying). He played them the Golltree, until their women cried tears; and he played them the Gauntree, until their women and youths burst into laughter; he played them the Suantree, until the entire host fell asleep. It was through that sleep that they (the three champions) escaped from those Fomorians who were desirous to slay them."

This passage is of threefold interest. It indicates the popular belief in the introduction of music into Ireland by the Tuatha da Danann, a mysterious race, by some regarded as an offshoot of the Danai, whom tradition declares to have conquered and civilised the country and then to have disappeared from it into fairyland. Again, it contains the first reference in Irish literature to the harp or cruit, destined to become our national instrument. Lastly, it describes three styles of Irish music, of each of which we have characteristic examples that have descended to the present day. For the Gauntree, which was provocation of mirth and frolic and excited spirit, is represented by the jigs, reels, planxties, and quick-step marches; the Golltree, or the sorrowful music, still lingers in the keens or lamentations, and some of our superb marches of the wilder and sadder type; and the Suantree survives in many a beautiful Irish

hush song.

The Irish sleep-compelling airs have not attracted the notice they deserve. Moore ignored them altogether, but Dr. Petrie prints many of them, and points out their resemblance to the slumber-tunes still in vogue in India and elsewhere in the East. They certainly support the tradition of the oriental affinities of the Early Irish.

The first period of Irish bardic literature may roughly be said to be that of epic poetry interspersed with songs. Fine exemplifications of these are to be found in the 'Silva Gadelica,' a recent translation of a series of Early Irish tales by Mr. Standish Hayes O'Grady. The music to which they were sung has perished or become dissociated from these lyrics, but some of their measures are identical with those of rustic Irish folk tunes. We now come to the bardic period, thus described by the poet Spenser in 'A View of the State of Ireland':

"Iren. There is amongst the Irish a certain kind of people called Bardes, which are to them instead of Poets, whose Profession