Historic Ulster. 65 



address myself not to the learned members of the Philosophical 

 Society, but rather to those who, having just finished their 

 education, have the study of Irish history an untrodden path 

 still before them. I shall lay down a sort of plan of study, and 

 mention the books which may most profitably be read ; most of 

 these, however expensive and rare, are within the reach of all in 

 the excellent collection which I have mentioned. It is quite 

 possible that many Ulster people have no desire for any 

 acquaintance with the past history of the province in which 

 they live. They perhaps glory in proclaiming that they are 

 Scots of Ulster, believing that as descendants of seventeenth 

 century planters they have no more connection with the ancient 

 Irish race than the people of the United States have with the 

 Red Indians. The position of anyone who cherishes this 

 fallacy is to be pitied. The greatest of Irish poets, Sir Samuel 

 Ferguson, has described 



" A rootless colonist of alien earth, 

 A stranger to the land that gave him birth, 

 The land a stranger to itself and him." 



The mere colonist to whom patriotism is impossible is to be 

 pitied ; how much more so the Scotch colonists in Ulster who 

 talk as if they were aliens here. It is as if Israel after her years 

 of exile would return to Zion and call her a foreign land. The 

 Scots had gone forth from Ireland, from Ulster in fact, and 

 returning here after many years they need not assume the 

 bearing of strangers towards a conquered race. They have 

 every right to share in the glory of ancient Ulla, every reason 

 to wish to study the story of her greatness. 



The pre-eminence of Ulster over all the provinces of Ireland 

 did not begin with the plantation, but traditions that cling 

 round the pre-historic monuments of the land show that before 

 recorded time the North was the habitation of the dominant 

 race. I shall not go beyond the traditionary coming of the 

 Scots or Milesians, an event ascribed to the 1 000th century B.C. 

 The land is then said to have been divided between Irian, 

 Eremonian, and Eberian tribes. The Eberian or Southern 



