Our purport is not of such vast import. We shall take in
these pages for the object of our study one of the smallest and,
apparently, most insignificant nations of modern Europe--the
Irish. For several ages they have lost even what generally
constitutes the basis of nationality, self-government; yet they have
preserved their individuality as strongly marked as though they
were still ruled by the O'Neill dynasty.

And we may here remark that the number of a people and the
size of its territory have absolutely no bearing on the estimate
which we ought to form of its character. Who would say that
the Chinese are the most interesting and commendable nation
on the surface of the globe? They are certainly the most ancient
and most populous; their code of precise and formal morality is
the most exact and clear that philosophers could ever dictate,
and succeed in giving as law to a great people. That code
has been followed during a long series of ages. Most discoveries
of modern European science were known to them long before
they were found out among us; agriculture, that first of arts,
which most economists consider as the great test whereby to
judge of the worth of a nation, is and always has been carried by
them to a perfection unknown to us. Yet, the smallest European
nationality is, in truth, more interesting and instructive than
the vast Celestial Empire can ever be--whose long annals
are all compassed within a few hundred pages of a frigid
narrative, void of life, and altogether void of soul.

But why do we select, among so many others, the Irish nation,
which is so little known, of such little influence, whose history
occupies only a few lines in the general annals of the world,