SIR,
I have been lately looking over the advertisements in some of your
Dublin newspapers, which are sent me to the country, and was much
entertained with a large list of denominations of lands, to be sold or
let. I am confident they must be genuine; for it is impossible that
either chance or modern invention could sort the alphabet in such a
manner as to make those abominable sounds; whether first invented to
invoke or fright away the devil, I must leave among the curious.
If I could wonder at anything barbarous, ridiculous, or absurd,
among us, this should be one of the first. I have often lamented that
Agricola, the father-in-law of Tacitus, was not prevailed on by that
petty king from Ireland, who followed his camp, to come over and
civilize us with a conquest, as his countrymen did Britain, where
several Roman appellations remain to this day, and so would the rest
have done, if that inundation of Angles, Saxons, and other northern
people, had not changed them so much for the worse, although in no
comparison with ours. In one of the advertisements just mentioned, I
encountered near a hundred words together, which I defy any creature in
human shape, except an Irishman of the savage kind, to pronounce;
neither would I undertake such a task, to be owner of the lands, unless
I had liberty to humanize the syllables twenty miles round. The
legislature may think what they please, and that they are above copying
the Romans in all their conquests of barbarous nations; but I am
deceived, if anything has more contributed to prevent the Irish from
being tamed, than this encouragement of their language, which might be
easily abolished, and become a dead one in half an age, with little
expense, and less trouble.
How is it possible that a gentleman who lives in those parts where
the town-lands (as they call them) of his estate produce such
odious sounds from the mouth, the throat, and the nose, can be able to
repeat the words without dislocating every muscle that is used in
speaking, and without applying the same tone to all other words, in
every language he understands; as it is plainly to be observed not only
in those people of the better sort who live in Galway and the Western
parts, but in most counties of Ireland?
It is true, that, in the city parts of London, the trading people
have an affected manner of pronouncing; and so, in my time, had many
ladies and coxcombs at Court. It is likewise true, that there is an odd
provincial cant in most counties in England, sometimes not very
pleasing to the ear; and the Scotch cadence, as well as expression, are
offensive enough. But none of these defects derive contempt to the
speaker: whereas, what we call the Irish brogue is no sooner
discovered, than it makes the deliverer in the last degree ridiculous
and despised; and, from such a mouth, an Englishman expects nothing but
bulls, blunders, and follies. Neither does it avail whether the censure
be reasonable or not, since the fact is always so. And, what is yet
worse, it is too well known, that the bad consequence of this opinion
affects those among us who are not the least liable to such reproaches,
farther than the misfortune of being born in Ireland, although of
English parents, and whose education has been chiefly in that kingdom.
I have heard many gentlemen among us talk much of the great
convenience to those who live in the country, that they should speak
Irish. It may possibly be so; but I think they should be such who never
intend to visit England, upon pain of being ridiculous; for I do not
remember to have heard of any one man that spoke Irish, who had not the
accent upon his tongue easily discernible to any English ear.
But I have wandered a little from my subject, which was only to
propose a wish that these execrable denominations were a little better
suited to an English mouth, if it were only for the sake of the English
lawyers; who, in trials upon appeals to the House of Lords, find so
much difficulty in repeating the names, that, if the plaintiff or
defendant were by, they would never be able to discover which were
their own lands. But, besides this, I would desire, not only that the
appellations of what they call town-lands were changed, but
likewise of larger districts, and several towns, and some counties; and
particularly the seats of country-gentlemen, leaving an alias to
solve all difficulties in point of law. But I would by no means trust
these alterations to the owners themselves; who, as they are generally
no great clerks, so they seem to have no large vocabulary about them,
nor to be well skilled in prosody. The utmost extent of their genius
lies in naming their country habitation by a hill, a mount, a brook, a
burrow, a castle, a bawn, a ford, and the like ingenious conceits. Yet
these are exceeded by others, whereof some have contrived anagramatical
appellations, from half their own and their wives' names joined
together: others only from the lady; as, for instance, a person whose
wife's name was Elizabeth, calls his seat by the name of Bess-borow. There is likewise a famous town, where the worst iron in the kingdom
is made, and it is called Swandlingbar: the original of which
name I shall explain, lest the antiquaries of future ages might be at a
loss to derive it. It was a most witty conceit of four gentlemen, who
ruined themselves with this iron project. Sw. stands for
Swift,[193] And, for Sanders, Ling for
Davling and Bar. for Barry. Methinks I see the four
loggerheads sitting in consult, like Smectymnuus, each gravely
contributing a part of his own name, to make up one for their place in
the ironwork; and could wish they had been hanged, as well as undone,
for their wit. But I was most pleased with the denomination of a
town-land, which I lately saw in an advertisement of Pue's paper: “This
is to give notice, that the lands of Douras, alias WHIG-
borough,” &c. Now, this zealous proprietor, having a mind to record
his principles in religion or loyalty to future ages, within five miles
round him, for want of other merit, thought fit to make use of this
expedient: wherein he seems to mistake his account; for this
distinguishing term, whig, had a most infamous original, denoting a man
who favoured the fanatic sect, and an enemy to kings, and so continued
till this idea was a little softened, some years after the Revolution,
and during a part of her late Majesty's reign. After which it was in
disgrace until the Queen's death, since which time it hath indeed
flourished with a witness: But how long will it continue so, in our
variable scene, or what kind of mortal it may describe, is a question
which this courtly landlord is not able to answer; and therefore he
should have set a date on the title of his borough, to let us know what
kind of a creature a whig was in that year of our Lord. I would readily
assist nomenclators of this costive imagination, and therefore I
propose to others of the same size in thinking, that, when they are at
a loss about christening a country-seat, instead of straining their
invention, they would call it Booby-borough, Fool-brook,
Puppy-ford, Coxcomb-hall, Mount-loggerhead,
Dunce-hill; which are innocent appellations, proper to express the
talents of the owners. But I cannot reconcile myself to the prudence of
this lord of WHIG-borough, because I have not yet heard, among
the Presbyterian squires, how much soever their persons and principles
are in vogue, that any of them have distinguished their country abode
by the name of Mount-regicide, Covenant-hall,
Fanatic-hill, Roundhead-bawn, Canting-brook, or
Mont-rebel, and the like; because there may probably come a time
when those kind of sounds may not be so grateful to the ears of the
kingdom. For I do not conceive it would be a mark of discretion, upon
supposing a gentleman, in allusion to his name, or the merit of his
ancestors, to call his house Tyburn-hall.
But the scheme I would propose for changing the denominations of
land into legible and audible syllables, is by employing some gentlemen
in the University; who, by the knowledge of the Latin tongue, and their
judgment in sounds, might imitate the Roman way, by translating those
hideous words into their English meanings, and altering the termination
where a bare translation will not form a good cadence to the ear, or be
easily delivered from the mouth. And, when both those means happen to
fail, then to name the parcels of land from the nature of the soil, or
some peculiar circumstance belonging to it; as, in England, Farn-ham, Oat-lands, Black-heath, Corn-bury, Rye-gate, Ash-burnham, Barn-elms, Cole-orton, Sand-wich, and many others.
I am likewise apt to quarrel with some titles of lords among us,
that have a very ungracious sound, which are apt to communicate mean
ideas to those who have not the honour to be acquainted with their
persons or their virtues, of whom I have the misfortune to be one. But
I cannot pardon those gentlemen who have gotten titles since the
judicature of the peers among us has been taken away, to which they all
submitted with a resignation that became good Christians, as
undoubtedly they are. However, since that time, I look upon a graceful
harmonious title to be at least forty per cent. in the value
intrinsic of an Irish peerage; and, since it is as cheap as the worst,
for any Irish law hitherto enacted in England to the contrary, I would
advise the next set, before they pass their patents, to call a
consultation of scholars and musical gentlemen, to adjust this most
important and essential circumstance. The Scotch noblemen, though born
almost under the north pole, have much more tunable appellations,
except some very few, which I suppose were given them by the Irish
along with their language, at the time when that kingdom was conquered
and planted from hence; and to this day retain the denominations of
places, and surnames of families, as all historians agree.[194]
I should likewise not be sorry, if the names of some bishops' sees
were so much obliged to the alphabet, that upon pronouncing them we
might contract some veneration for the order and persons of those
reverend peers, which the gross ideas sometimes joined to their titles
are very unjustly apt to diminish.