JOHN BOYLE O’REILLY
The extremely romantic life of John Boyle O’Reilly began on June 28th, 1844, at Dowth Castle, near the town of Drogheda in Ireland. His chivalrous nature and passionate love of country and of liberty were stimulated by the traditions and beauty of the surroundings and by the atmosphere of legend and story in which he was brought up by his schoolmaster father and clever and gifted mother. As a young man he was employed as a compositor in a printing office in Ireland and later at Preston in Lancashire. In consequence of his connection with the Fenian movement he was banished to Australia, whence he escaped to America in 1869, settling in Boston, where his ability as poet, journalist and orator was quickly recognized. Maurice Francis Egan has said of him: “In the United States, after adventures by sea and land, and tortures and suffering borne with a heroism that was both Greek and Christian, he found the spirit of freedom in concrete form. Our country satisfied his aspirations for liberty; he loved Ireland not less, but America more; he was exiled from the land of his birth, yet he found ample consolation in the country he had chosen.”
The life of the poet by James Jeffrey Roche, together with his complete poems and speeches, edited by Mrs. O’Reilly, was published by Cassell in 1891. A volume of selected poems was published by Kenedy in 1913.
THE EXILE OF THE GAEL
“What have ye brought to our Nation-building, Sons of the Gael?
What is your burden or guerdon from old Innisfail?”
“No treasure we bring from Erin—nor bring we shame nor guilt!
The sword we hold may be broken, but we have not dropped the hilt!
The wreath we bear to Columbia is twisted of thorns, not bays,