268 BRITISH ETHNOLOGY v 



Ethnologically, the Irish people were originally, 

 like the people of Britain, a mixture of Melano- 

 chroi and Xanthochroi. They resembled the 

 Britons in speaking a Celtic tongue ; but it was a 

 Gaelic and not a Cymric form of the Celtic lan- 

 guage. Ireland was untouched by the Roman 

 conquest, nor do the Saxons seem to have had any 

 influence upon her destinies, but the Danes and 

 Norsemen poured in a contingent of Teutonism, 

 which has been largely supplemented by English 

 and Scotch efforts. 



What, then, is the value of the ethnological 

 difference between the Englishman of the western 

 half of England and the Irishman of the eastern 

 half of Ireland ? For what reason does the one 

 deserve the name of a " Celt," and not the other ? 

 And further, if we turn to the inhabitants of the 

 western half of Ireland, why should the term 

 "Celts" be applied to them more than to the 

 inhabitants of Cornwall? And if the name is 

 applicable to the one as justly as to the other, why 

 should not intelligence, perseverance, thrift, in- 

 dustry, sobriety, respect for law, be admitted to be 

 Celtic virtues ? And why should we not seek for 

 the cause of their absence in something else than 

 the idle pretext of " Celtic blood " ? 



I have been unable to meet with any answers 

 to these questions. 



V. The Celtic and the Teutonic dialects arc 

 members of the same great Aryan family of Ian* 



