Who fears to speak of Ninety-Eight?
Who blushes at the name?
When cowards mock the patriot’s fate,
Who hangs his head for shame?
He’s all a knave or half a slave,
Who slights his country thus;
But a true man, like you, man,
Will fill your glass with us.
We drink the memory of the brave,
The faithful and the few:
Some lie far off beyond the wave,
Some sleep in Ireland, too.
All, all are gone; but still lives on
The fame of those who died;
And true men, like you men,
Remember them with pride.
Some on the shores of distant lands
Their weary hearts have laid,
And by the stranger’s heedless hands
Their lonely graves were made;
But though their clay be far away
Beyond th’ Atlantic foam,
In true men, like you, men,
Their spirit’s still at home.
The dust of some is Irish earth;
Among their own they rest;
And the same land that gave them birth
Has caught them to her breast;
And we will pray that from their clay
Full many a race may start
Of true men, like you, men,
To act as brave a part.
They rose in dark and evil days
To right their native land;
They kindled here a living blaze
That nothing shall withstand.
Alas! that might can vanquish right—
They fell and pass’d away;
But true men, like you, men,
Are plenty here to-day.
Then here’s their memory! may it be
For us a guiding light,
To cheer our strife for liberty
And teach us to unite.
Through good and ill, be Ireland’s still,
Though sad as theirs your fate,
And true men, be you, men,
Like those of Ninety-Eight!
John Kells Ingram.
