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Her sons gave glory to a nation. We remember and are proud of this
PATRIOT MOTHER
SHE was a Dublin girl; her people came from Co. Meath, A gentle girl, with a hidden reserve of courage and steadfastness, and she was destined for the role of a patriot mother. Her early years were lived against a background that was essentially of the true Gaelic Ireland.
The history of her country was a living saga in her heart. If to love Ireland beyond life itself is an almighty folly, then this girl was guilty of that folly. The years slip by, and the young girl assumes the role of wife and mother. A mother instilling into the hearts of her children a love for the simple and enduring things of life. A mother with sublime and absolute unselfishness directing and reflecting back into the heart of Ireland the love and devotion she inspired in her children.
Interweaving through the pattern of her daily living was the thread of a deep spiritual fervour. Understanding, so vital in their early years, she gave to
A woman with a proud lift to her head watched at a gateway as her sons went forth: finely-fashioned hand resting on sword hilt—
"Soft hand that played at my breast, strong hand that will fall heavy on the Gall, brave hand that will break the yoke!"
Their eyes held, all the years of their living were merged into this moment of realisation.
"Go, and God go with ye, if we do not meet again, we will meet in Heaven."
The echo of the woundedness in her voice is imprisoned forever in her parting words. Branches a delicate lace work against a night sky, a shadowed road that gave no return.
Her sons, small and helpless
once, now one wears the uniform of a Commander-in-Chief of the Irish Republican Army. The echoes of a firing squad dying on the morning air, the dream breaking in an agonising movement in a mother's heart.
"Tell him that mother will be braver than ever, and that she will carry her cross."
A courage-drenched thought piercing the veils between earthly existence and eternity, linking the present with the hereafter. Courage that was the substance of their living, the strength and sweetness of their dying. And after, no more for her the surge of their living hopes and ideals, only the shallows of memory.
THE remembering of a mother through the years. The vast emptiness of a study, shafts of evening sunlight touching unopened books. Ink dried to a brown rust on a pen, white paper that will no longer take the imprint of the treasures of his mind. Seeing the beauty of the world with his eyes.
"How beautiful the world of God's creation, mother, see the slanting rays of the sun."
An early photograph of Mrs. Pearse
Voices sweeping the strings of her heart, children's voices, eager boys' voices. Low beautiful voices of their manhood, shot with the fire of their idealistic visions. Blossom - frosted branches of the Spring bringing the awareness of a son's closeness to eternal beauty. Her son—oh proud thought—before his going fashioned a rann for Mary's son, the golden-haired Iosa. A rann that was singing in his heart when he went to meet Him on a May morning.
Her son, amid all his great visions, turned aside to give Iosa the thornless spray of blossom of the flowering tree of Ireland. To thread the rowan berries on the silver beams of the moon, to dip them in the shining lakes and rivers of Ireland, so that the glisten and sheen of them might gladden the heart of Iosa, weaving ribbons of light in the meadow grass, as He trails them in His hands which hold the healing of the world.
Deep the remembering of a woman's heart, and deep the remembering of a Nation's heart at Easter time. Let the theme of her great love and sacrifice throb through the Easter symphony of suffering and triumph. We remember and are proud of Margaret Pearse—her sons gave glory to a nation; she, being only a woman, gave the pulse beats of her heart that this glory might have being.

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ST. DOULOUGH'S
Most schoolboys are familiar with the little story forming part of the stock-in-trade of many masters who endeavour to impress on their young charges the great advantage of keeping one's eyes open. It concerned two young men who were being interviewed by a merchant as a result of their application for the position he had announced vacant. The merchant found it very hard to decide which
actually read their own notes. An idea struck the merchant, and he suddenly asked one of the men if he knew where postage stamps could be procured in the neighbourhood. "No, sir," replied the applicant, "but it won't take me long to find out."
The second man, on being asked the same question, promptly replied that he had noticed a post office two doors away, and
missed by the unobservant wheelman who sets out for Malahide, Howth, Bray, etc., merely determined to get there as soon as possible, and caring little for the links with our forefathers' time which a little observation would reveal.
ST. DOULOUGH'S.
Take the first-mentioned place, Malahide.
and with head well down over the handlebars he scorched along in a cloud of dust, and in his efforts to pedal up that hill outside Balgriffin he failed to notice at the top of the incline a rugged old cross on the side of the road, and in the adjacent field a quaint old church with a stone roof.
THE CROSS.
The cross attracts one's attention first. Weather-beaten and worn with age, its arms reduced to mere stumps, it stands a lonely figure, guarding as it were the path leading to the church. The latter is well worth exploring. It is the most interesting example in Ireland of the early Saxon stone-roofed church, and in very good preservation. Inside are several compartments, including a small alcove, said to have been a penitential cell. The exact date of this old ruin is not known, but most antiquarians maintain it was built in the 11th or 12th century. An underground passage formerly led to the Holy Well, still to be seen in a neighbouring field. This well was dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, and is covered by a stone canopy picturesquely draped with ivy, being not the least interesting of the group of antiquities in this part of County Dublin.
A STROLL ROUND.
Now, Mr. Scorcher, when next you spin to the town of the famous Talbot family, walk up that hill at Balgriffin. It will rest your heart, and your chain—I mean your bike's chain. Leave your machine in the field, and stroll around the ground once trod by St. Doulough. Explore the church and well used by the saint, and, having done so you will agree with me that your visit Malahide has been made far more enjoyable by the short stop you made at this wonderman of ancient Ireland.
That the name was Pettigrew. The observant man got the job.
I'm afraid very few cyclists pay much end to the moral of that story, and what best futil old relics of ancient Ireland are
Nearly every Dublin cyclist will tell you he has been there, not once, but dozens of times. But ask him did he explore St. Doulough's on the way, and he will look amazed, and ask you what is it, and where is it. He never heard of it. No. He set out for Malahide,

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" Drumcondra. "
By Tolka's banks in youth I strayed.
And Life's first wonder dream
In shady pools I saw displayed,
Or, resting in some alia glade,
I heard the song the thrushes made
By that delightful stream.
Ah! strong was hope and life was gay,
And fear was all unborn,
When, rising at the break of day,
We sought the Weir and swam away
Between those banks whose green array
Was crowned with perfumed thorn.
I wonder does the schoolhouse still
Contain a merry throng,
Whose laughter in the play hours fill
The street beyond its walls until
The passers-by recall the thrill
Of Youth's long silent song!
Friends write about the changes there,
And know not how they pain,
They emphasise the modern six
That marks Drumcondra everywhere,
And wonder why I do not care
To see my home again.
Gone are those scenes in youth I know,
The hawthorn blooms no more:
Drab houses stand where bushes grew,
O'er fields that shone with morning dest.
Are busy streets that hold no clue
To loveliness of yore.
Yet there is still a garden where
A noble ash doth grow;
Mine was the hand that piaced it there,
And there it lived with loving care
Through summer heat and winter bare
O'er thirty years ago!
To old Drumcondra o'er the sea
I do return at night,
Upon the wings of memory,
When sleep awakes the youth in me,
And things are as I'd have them be,
In dreams of pare delight.
STANLEY O. BATT,
2nd Officer ss. Maheno.
Co Union S.S. Co., Ltd.,
Auckland, New Zealand.

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Dublin Was a Musical City
DUBLIN used to be a musical city, they say. Used to be a present and a traditional furled umbrella of the outraged music lover, on behalf of the past—the glorious past when great singers from all over the world automatically included Dublin in their itineraries.
The list of their names reads like a musical roll of honour as they came at the height of their powers, confident that musical Dublin would flock to hear them. It started in the early 18th century, fifty years after Charles II's order of 1661, providing that:
(1) John Ogilby should be granted for the lives in Ireland.
(2) He should be licensed to build upon such grounds by him to be purchased... in Dublin or elsewhere in Ireland such Theatre or Theatres as to him shall seem most fit... and therein to represent Comedyes, Tragedyes and Operas and other Entertained decent and not obnoxious with prohibition to all other persons to perform ye same without license first and obtained from him.
In March, 1711, Dublin has its first experience of Italian opera with a performance of Handel's "Rinaldo," given by Nicolini and his company. The celebrated Italian singer had already done much to popularise Handel's operas in England, and it has been suggested that his company was formed by Owen McSwiney, a London impressionist from Co Wexford.
An Irish Tenor's Debut
A NOTHER season of Italian opera followed in 1761 and in 1776 another in which the subsequent celebrated Irish tenor, Michael Kelly, made his debut in the first performance of Piccinni's "La Buona Figliuola."
Opera could not yet be said to have got under way in Ireland, but the first signs of the golden age appeared with Giuseppe Ambrogetti, a baritone whose acting ability seems to have been far in advance of his vocal powers.
His favourite part was the title role in "Don Giovanni" (first given in Dublin in 1819), and we read that he was "rapturously encored in the 'Give My Thy Hand' aria, and was greeted with frequent bursts of applause during the evening."
The resplendent period really began, however, in 1821 with the opening of the Theatre Royal in Hawkins Street. At first, the "Royal" was devoted to legitimate drama but the management soon realised the commercial potentialities of musically-minded Dublin and started importing foreign opera companies and stars who
came over each year after their London season.
Tenor, Bass and Soprano
A NGELICA CATALANI was one of the first of the great divas to appear on the Dublin boards. She had already won a reputation in London and on the Continent; and Napoleon himself, on hearing her, had given her a contract to sing in Paris at 100,000 francs a year.
Her voice was said to be "phenomonally flexible accurate and powerful, unexcelled in bravura passages and with extensive range in pitch and quality," but her acting lacked grace and ease.
She reveled in vocal acrobatics, which distressed some of the more refined musical tastes of the time. So powerful was her voice, that "she should bear down and overpower by could force of lungs the brazen instruments of the orchestra." She seems to have been regarded by her listeners with a mixture of awe and anguish. A contemporary account of a concert says that "Catalani certainly gave a varied programme, infringing on the domains of tenor, bass and soprano".
"Operatic Glamour Girl"
THE next celebrated singer at the Royal was Madame Vestris who had been trained by Haydn Corri, the Dublin Pro-Cathedral organist. Vestris appeared here first in 1824 and her appearance, "rather petite but finely formed," so captivated the gentlemen of the audience that she quickly became a favourite.
In his book, "Opera in Old Dublin," Dr. T. F. Walsh, Chairman of the Wexford Festival Committee, dubs her "an operatic glamour girl."
Catherine Stephens followed and Mary Anne Paton, for whom Weber wrote the part of Rezia in "Oberon," and then came Pasta the "Mrs. Siddons" of opera.
Pasta seems to have been the first of the great prima donnas to pay any but the most perfunctory attention to the dramatic demands of operatic roles.
Of when she came to Dublin in 1827, she was already a reigning star in Paris, Rome, Milan, Venice and London.
Pasta's voice embraced two and a half octaves and her singing was artistically restrained in the use of ornamentation—a startling innovation for the Italian style. The Dublin critics were delighted although the public's enthusiasm waned after her first few performances.
Balfe as the Baritone
THE next really great name to appear on the operatic bills in Dublin was Giovanni Battista Rubini who came in 1833. Hailed as the "King of Tenors" he retired seven years later with an immense fortune. It was he who introduced that lamentable sob on the second past note of an aria.
He became the special interpreter of Donizetti and Bellini, creating the role of Elvino in "La
IN THIS MUSIC "SEASON" OF OPERA AND FEISEANNA
MARESE MURPHY
WRITES OF SOME WORLD-FAMOUS GUEST SINGERS OF THE PAST
Sonnambula—an opera which has won renewed popularity in Ireland since its brilliant presentation at the Wexford Festival last November.
With Rubini came Fanny Perslani for whom Donizetti wrote "Lucia di Lammermoor," excerpts of which they sang at the Rotunda. It is one of the operas of this year's season in Dublin.
In November of the same year Michael Balfe, already known as an operatic composer, appeared at the Theatre Royal as the principal of the Love Test.
In 1840 the dramatic soprano, Grisl, appeared in Donizetti's "Anna Bolena." Her reputation was enormous and she was responsible for the popularity in Dublin of
"Norma," which had been already produced in 1836. Another great soprano, Ebbe Stignani, is to sing the part here again in a few weeks' time.
A Lind First Night
IN October, 1848, one of the century took place. "The Swedish Nightingale," Jenny Lind, appeared at the Theatre Royal in "La Sonnambula," with Balfe conducting. She was enthusiastically received in Dublin and receipts for her first night totalled £1,600.
It was in 1861 that Adelina Patti made her first appearance in Dublin. She was then only eighteen years old and had made
her debut as Lucia in New York two years previously.
Many of the older generation of Dublin music lovers remember her visits and the demonstrations of with enthusiasm when her admirers unyoked the horses from her carriage and pulled it through the streets themselves.
In 1880 the Theatre Royal was burnt down and on its outgrew its usefulness and was knocked down to make room for a new Theatre Royal in 1897.
The roll-call of great singers continued onwards most of the names are within living memory. Dr. John F. Larchet, for so many years Ireland's unofficial musical host, remembers all of them.
There was Emmy Destinn, Albani, and the coloratura, Tetrazzini, Dr. Larchet recalls arriving late for a Caruso concert at the Theatre Royal and hearing the great tenor's first song perfectly from the vestibule.
Caruso's unfailing good humour made him a beloved as well as a revered figure. Many tales are told about his determination never to disappoint his audience. Once, when he sang in Mexico City, the Bull Ring, which had excellent accounts and a seating capacity of 14,000, was chosen for the concert.
About half-way through the rain started, but the Mexicans stayed in their seats so, true to his tradition. Caruso continued the conce