that cycle is itself a portion of the history of Ireland, and
pre-supposes other preceding and succeeding cyles, preceding and
succeeding kings. The event of which this epic treats occurred at
the time of the Incarnation, and its characters are the leading
Irish kings and warriors of that date. Such is the Tan-bo-Cooalney.

This being so, how have the English literary classes recognised, or
how treated, our claim to the possession of an antique literature
of peculiar historical interest, and by reason of that antiquity, a
matter of concern to all Aryan nations? The conquest has not more
constituted the English Parliament guardian and trustee of Ireland,
for purposes of legislation and government, than it has vested the
welfare and fame of our literature and antiquities in the hands of
English scholarship. London is the headquarters of the intellectualism
and of the literary and historical culture of the Empire. It is the
sole dispenser of fame. It alone influences the mind of the country
and guides thought and sentiment. It can make and mar reputations.
What it scorns or ignores, the world, too, ignores and scorns. How
then has the native literature of Ireland been treated by the
representatives of English scholarship and literary culture? Mr.
Carlyle is the first man of letters of the day, his the highest
name as a critic upon, and historian of, the past life of Europe.
Let us hear him upon this subject, admittedly of European
importance.

Miscellaneous Essays, Vol. III., page 136. "Not only as the oldest
Tradition of Modern Europe does it--the Nibelungen--possess a high
antiquarian interest, but farther, and even in the shape we now see
it under, unless the epics of the son of Fingal had some sort of
authenticity, it is our oldest poem also."