THE LANGUAGE MOVEMENT 7 



body of the Gaelic League think it their duty to issue a 

 public warning concerning the malpractices of an obscure 

 body of faddists, who might if left alone actually increase 

 the pace of the machine to quite an appreciable extent. 

 But at any cost the pace must be increased. 



Seventeen years ago the Gaelic League was founded. 

 1 can well remember the time. For four or five years we 

 were a feeble folk, an obscure body of cranks and faddists, 

 quite as absurd as any spelling reformer can be in these days, 

 but we had the enthusiasm of youth and the faith that 

 moves mountains. After the first Oireachtas of 1897 and 

 the starting of Fdinne an Lae in 1898, the Gaelic League 

 came into the light of day, and made such a stir that some 

 of its members expected miracles. The proverb tells us 

 that " every beginning is weak/' but, as is often the case 

 with proverbs, the reverse is also true. The beginning of 

 every movement is strong with a strength that belongs 

 to the beginning only. Twelve years ago it was possible 

 it cost a good deal of energy and enthusiasm, but still 

 it was possible to get together one hundred eager students 

 of Irish, where only one had existed twelve months before. 

 This apparent increase of 10,000 per cent, actually led 

 some leaders in the movement to prophecy that we were 

 near the hill-top, and that in ten years all Ireland would 

 be Irish-speaking. It is easier nowadays to calculate the 

 normal rate of progress. Think of all the labour, the 

 energy, the enthusiasm, the money expended in this city 

 of Dublin during the last ten years. I will not say it has 

 been in vain, for whether the progress made be fast or 

 slow, devoted service to an ideal is its own .reward. But 

 apart from the workers, has the movement as a move- 

 ment been successful ? 1 know there have been pro- 

 cessions, and plays, and ornamental lettering over shop 

 fronts and at street corners, and much enjoyable com- 

 panionship. But has a single street been GaeHcized ? A 

 single household ? Or, put it this way is there a single 

 individual of those who entered a Gaelic class in Dublin 

 ten years ago who knows Irish to-day as well as he or 

 she knows English ? For that is the goal. If there is 



