The Wearing of the Green

A free download from http://www.dertz.in


The Wearing of the Green

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Wearing of the Green, by A.M.
Sullivan This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and
with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away
or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Wearing of the Green
Author: A.M. Sullivan
Release Date: July 8, 2004 [EBook #12853]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
WEARING OF THE GREEN ***

Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Martin Pettit and PG Distributed
Proofreaders

[Transcriber's note: The spelling inconsistencies of the original are
retained in this etext.]

THE
"WEARING OF THE GREEN,"
OR THE PROSECUTED FUNERAL PROCESSION.
* * * * *
Let the echoes fall unbroken; Let our tears in silence flow; For each
word thus nobly spoken, Let us yield a nation's woe; Yet, while
weeping, sternly keeping Wary watch upon the foe.
Poem in the "NATION."
DUBLIN:
A.M. SULLIVAN, ABBEY STREET.
1868.

THE
PROSECUTED FUNERAL PROCESSION.
* * * * *
The news of the Manchester executions on the morning of Saturday,
23rd November, 1867, fell upon Ireland with sudden and dismal
disillusion.
In time to come, when the generation now living shall have passed
away, men will probably find it difficult to fully realize or understand
the state of stupor and amazement which ensued in this country on the
first tidings of that event; seeing, as it may be said, that the victims had
lain for weeks under sentence of death, to be executed on this date. Yet
surprise indubitably was the first and most overpowering emotion; for,
in truth, no one up to that hour had really credited that England would

take the lives of those three men on a verdict already publicly admitted
and proclaimed to have been a blunder. Now, however, came the news
that all was over--that the deed was done--and soon there was seen such
an upheaving of national emotion as had not been witnessed in Ireland
for a century. The public conscience, utterly shocked, revolted against
the dreadful act perpetrated in the outraged name of justice. A great
billow of grief rose and surged from end to end of the land. Political
distinctions disappeared or were forgotten. The Manchester
Victims--the Manchester Martyrs, they were already called--belonged
to the Fenian organization; a conspiracy which the wisest and truest
patriots of Ireland had condemned and resisted; yet men who had been
prominent in withstanding, on national grounds, that hopeless and
disastrous scheme--priests and laymen--were now amongst the
foremost and the boldest in denouncing at every peril the savage act of
vengeance perpetrated at Manchester. The Catholic clergy were the
first to give articulate expression to the national emotion. The
executions took place on Saturday; before night the telegraph had
spread the news through the island; and on the next morning, being
Sunday, from a thousand altars the sad event was announced to the
assembled worshippers, and prayers were publicly offered for the souls
of the victims. When the news was announced, a moan of sorrowful
surprise burst from the congregation, followed by the wailing and
sobbing of women; and when the priest, his own voice broken with
emotion, asked all to join with him in praying the Merciful God to
grant those young victims a place beside His throne, the assemblage
with one voice responded, praying and weeping aloud!
The manner in which the national feeling was demonstrated on this
occasion was one peculiarly characteristic of a nation in which the
sentiments of religion and patriotism are so closely blended. No stormy
"indignation meetings" were held; no tumult, no violence, no cries for
vengeance arose. In all probability--nay, to a certainty--all this would
have happened, and these ebullitions of popular passion would have
been heard, had the victims not passed into eternity. But now, they
were gone where prayer alone could follow; and in the presence of this
solemn fact the religious sentiment overbore all others with the Irish
people. Cries of anger, imprecations, and threats of vengeance, could

not avail the dead; but happily religion gave a vent to the pent-up
feelings of the living. By prayer and mourning they could at once, most
fitly and most successfully, demonstrate their horror of the guilty deed,
and their sympathy with the innocent victims.
Requiem Masses forthwith were announced and celebrated in several
churches; and were attended by crowds everywhere too vast for the
sacred edifices to contain. The churches in several instances were
draped with black, and the ceremonies conducted with more than
ordinary solemnity. In every case, however, the authorities of the
Catholic church