“Angle-land,”—said the doctor, interrupting him.
“Now, Dr. Tourniquet, I beg I may not be interrupted by your ridiculous blunders,” observed Fortyfolios with considerable asperity, and a look of dignity peculiar to himself.
“The blunder is on your side, don’t you see,” replied the surgeon, with a chuckle of satisfaction exceedingly annoying to his companion.
“Never mind if it be Ingle-land or Angle-land,” exclaimed Oriel Porphyry. “All we know for certain is, that it is now called England. But how do you account for the adoption of the other name?”
“Of the derivation of that word there can be no doubt—it explains itself,” said Fortyfolios. “Ireland means the land of ire. The natives from time immemorial have been known to be excessively irascible. They would quarrel upon the slightest cause, and fight from no cause at all. They would fight when they were hungry, upon which occasion, as was very natural, they fought for a belly-full. They would fight for liquor; they would fight for fun; they would fight for love; they would fight to get drunk, and then fight to get sober. The happiest men among them were those who were most frequently beaten, and such persons were known to be the best friends as were continually trying to knock out each other’s brains. These men consequently got the appropriate name of Ire-ishmen, and the island was called Ire-land.”
“There you’re wrong again, don’t you see,” observed Tourniquet. “The name Ire-land was derived from Higher-land, to express that the country was more elevated in the estimation of the natives than any other part of the globe. They entertained the most preposterous ideas about the importance of their island. They stated that when the rest of the world was sunk in barbarism, their Higher-land was the seat of intelligence, and virtue, and superior bravery. They asserted that their soldiers were the only soldiers that ever existed, and that their agricultural labourers were ‘the finest pisantry in the world.’ But there was certainly something very singular about them; and even their brick-layers’ labourers were odd men. The island was also called by the natives The Emerald Island, I believe because it sometimes produced Irish diamonds. The Green Isle was another of its names—and this was derived from the greenness of the people. The men went by the name of ‘the boys’ long after the age at which other boys became men; and even the oldest of the old men among them, when he breathed his last, was said to die in a green old age.”
“It is extraordinary to me, Dr. Tourniquet, that you will give utterance to such fallacies,” remarked the professor. “The facts are exactly as I have stated them.”
“The facts are exactly as I have stated them,” said the other with marked emphasis.