REBEL BATTLE SONGS SINN FEIN "MARSEILLAISE."
The special correspondent of the "Dally Mail" writing from Tipperary in October, says:--
The literature and music of Sinn Feinery make a strange medley of passion, pathos, and bathos. Until recently
a secret printing press in Limerick (sought for in vain by the authorities of law and order) has been supplying
revolutionary literature for the "irrepressibles" of Limerick and Clare ; and there are half a dozen rebel
newspapers published weekly in Dublin and Belfast.
They are all tarred with the same brush, from Mr. Arthur Griffith's "Nationality" downwards. Each has its poet's corner.
Ireland is rich just now in revolutionary minor poets who, between the acts of drilling, marching and
conspiring, find time to wood the rebel Muse. The most successful of these efforts (published originally in a
banned news sheet) has been set to music.
It is called "The Soldier's Song"; everybody is singing it and whistling itin the south and west to day.
It is the Sinn Fein "Marseillaise," and though it has a certain strident swing to
its chorus, it lacks the fire and thrust of "The Red Flag." Here are the first and last verses:--
We'll sing a song, a soldier's song,
With a cheerful, rousing chorus.
As round our blazing fires we throng,
The starry heavens o'er us;
Impatient for the coming fight.
And as we wait the morning's light.
Here In the silence of the night,
We'll chant a soldier's song.
Sons of the Gael, men of the Pale,
The long-watched day is breaking,
The serried ranks of Inisfail
Shall set the tyrant quaking.
Our camp-fires now are burning low.
See in the east a silver glow.
So chant a soldier's song!
The chorus runs as follows:--
Soldiers are we, whose lives are pledged to Ireland;
Some have come from a land beyond the wave.
Sworn to be free, no more our ancient sire-land
Shall shelter the despot or the slave.
To-night we man the Chana bael.
In Erin's cause, come woe or weal,
"Mld cannons' roar ; and rifles peal
We'll chant the soldier's song!
Thousand strong Chorus.
You can hear a thousand young men chanting this along the Dublin road on a Sunday afternoon, with the rain pouring down
and the side drums beating a husky tattoo.
Almost as popular as 'The Soldier's Song' is "Prepare!" whlch begins thus:
Prepare again, brave Irishmen!
Be ready for the Call.
Your motherland is waiting
And watching for you all
To free her from the bondage
Of British slavery,
And strike again another blow
For Erin's liberty.
We're proud that we are Irish,
And Irish Volunteers,
Who dread no Saxon tyranny
Or heed their cruel sneers.
Our leaders have prove true to us.
For us they nobly died;
But vengeance shall be with us.
Ere the widow's tears are dried!
Thanks to Judas Redmond
For our hard and bitter case,
And all the cruel misfortunes
That befell our Irish race.
He was the only lap dog
That our British tyrant had,
To them he sold his country
As Judas sold his God!
With Home Rule on the Statute-book
Recruiting he did go,
In hopes to gain more British gold
For himself and holest Joe (Devlln).
He thought to dupe our Irish boys
To fight the honest Hun:
To the shambles out in Flanders
He would send them one by one.
A verse follows in praise of the "martyrs" of Easter week, who are individually named, and the song ends:
May God be with those heroes,
Their troubles now are o'er;
They are looking down from Heaven
For the freedom of our shore.
"Who Fears to Speak of Easter Week" is another popular ditty, sung to the lilt of "Ninetv-Eight"
My interesting rebel friends in Clare, urged to blood-heat by de Valera, march to Ellen O'Leary's fierce
dirge of the "Dead Who Died for Ireland":
Then fling your green flag to the sky,
Be "Limerick!" your battle cry,
And charge till blood flows fetlock high
Around the track of Clare's Dragoons.
These battle songs and a number of others full of "ginger" are published specially by the Sinn Fein Press.
They are sold quietly by the thousand.
Notes
From the West Australian Newspaper The Daily News 28 Dec 1917 p. 6.
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