PEA AND BEAN TRIBE 185 



whether the national badge of the Irish, the Shamrock, is the leaf of the 

 wood-sorrel, or that of one of the Trefoils. The Shamrock has been worn 

 by the Irish for many centuries on the seventeenth of March, which is the 

 anniversary of their patron saint, St. Patrick. The original name of this 

 missionary is said by Mr. Jones, in his " Historical Account of the Welsh 

 Bards," to have been Maenwyn ; his name of Patricius having been given by 

 Pope Celestine, when he sent him to preach the Gospel to the pagan Irish. 

 When this missionary landed at Wicklow, A.D. 433, the people were at first 

 ready to stone him. He entreated a hearing, and, while stating to his 

 audience the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, he is said to have plucked a 

 Trefoil from the ground, and said, " Is it not as possible for the Father, Son, 

 and Holy Ghost to be one, as for these three leaves to grow upon a single 

 stalk ?" The act and word were well adapted to fix the attention and convey 

 the idea to an ignorant but imaginative people, and thus to fix on their 

 memories the important truth of Revelation, though the solemn mystery 

 itself can be explained by no earthly tongue, nor fully symbolized by any 

 earthly emblem. 



What this leaf may have been, this ancient Shamrog or Seamrog, learned 

 men after all their researches cannot fully prove, and the same arguments 

 addressed to different minds, have brought to one antiquary the conviction 

 that it was the wood-sorrel, to another that it was a Clover leaf. The leaf 

 of the White or Dutch Clover seems to be the plant often worn by the 

 modern Irish, and Irish students at the colleges of Edinburgh have sometimes 

 cultivated this Clover in little patches, that a leaf might adorn their hats ; 

 but many Irishmen gather indiscriminately a handful of the leaves of any 

 species. M. Bicheno, who some years since investigated the subject very 

 fully, believed that the original leaf was that of the wood-sorrel. He remarks, 

 "The term Shamrock seems a general appellation for the Trefoils, or three- 

 leaved plants. Gerarde says, ' The Meadow Trefoils are called in Ireland 

 Shamrocks,' and I find the name so applied in other authors. The Irish 

 names for Trifolium rcpens, are, Seamar-oge, Shamrog, and Shamrock. In 

 Gaelic the name Seamrog is applied by Lightfoot to the Trifolium rejjens ; 

 while in the Gaelic Dictionary, published by the Gaelic Society, under the 

 word Seamrog, many plants are mentioned to which the word is prefixed as 

 a generic term ; as Seamrog chamdlli, Purple Clover ; Seamrog chrS, small 

 speedwell ; Seamrog m'huire, pimpernel. I conclude from this that Shamrock 

 is a generic word, common to the Gaelic and Irish languages, and consequently 

 not limited to the Trifolium repens." 



In Fynes Morison, a notice occurs so late as the year 1598, in which the 

 "wilde Irish" are said to "willingly eat the hearbe Shamrocke, being of a 

 sharp taste, which as they run and are chased to and fro, they snatche like 

 beastes out of the ditches." M. Bicheno infers that this author alluded to 

 the wood-sorrel, and the " sharp taste " would certainly indicate this herb, 

 only that as wood-sorrel never grows in ditches, it is quite as likely to refer 

 to the water-cress. The wood-sorrel is not now common in Ireland, but this 

 author justly observes that it may in former years have been so, the wood- 

 lands of Ireland having now been so much cut down, partly by the natives 

 to supply their wants, and partly also by the Government to prevent their 



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