Irish eloquence.

From Treasury of Irish eloquence: being a compendium of Irish oratory and literature by P. D. Nunan, Edmund Burke, Henry Grattan, John Philpot Curran

Equally unnecessary is it for me to dwell on the courage, tho bravery, the chivalry of my fellow-countrymen. Many a hardfought field on the Continent of Europe and the Continent of America can testify to the valor and pluck of the Irish soldier, There is something almost ludicrous in the eagerness with which an Irishman longs to be in the thick of a fight. Like the war-horse in Job, n he smelleth the battle afar off, and he crieth ha! ha!” Wherever fighting is to be done there is the irrepressible Patrick. Namur is familiar with his great war-cry. The Adige and Cremona have witnessed the strength of his arm. Blenheim remembers Lord Clare’s Dragoons: the deeds of the Irish Brigade at Kamillies and Fontenoy we repeat like a pater-noster. The olive-groves of Spain have drunk the young blood of the Irish soldier. In the republics of Chili, Bolivia, and Venezuela, the praises of O’Brien, Dillon, Devereux, and other Irish patriots, are yet sung in the soft Castilian tongue by the banks of the Orinoco and the mountain fastnesses of tho Andes. What shall I say to the exploits of my fellow-countrymen in your late civil war! Let Bull Run and the Rappahaunock speak. Let Gain’s Hill and Malvern Hill, and Antietam, :!ad numerous other scenes of warfare speak, and tell if the children of Hibcrnia turned their backs upon their foe. By the banks of the Euxine and beneath the shadows of the Himalayas, in the Crimea and in India, Irishmen have won the laurels of the brave. They fought for the Father of their Church at Spoleto and Ancoua. At the present moment the proudest, the most unblemished, the most martial name amongst the legions of Europe is Patrick MacMahon, inheritor of all the dignity and chivalry of a warlike ancestry, while thousands of his race, animated by the same martial instincts as his own, flock from the Green Isle to swell the ranks of struggling France, and throw the balance of their strength and valor against the cruel and rapacious Teuton.