greatest evils yet are scarce begun.
Soon shall thy sons (the time is just at hand)
Be all made captives in their native land;
When for the use of no Hibernian born,
Shall rise one blade of grass, one ear of corn;
When shells and leather shall for money pass,
Nor thy oppressing lords afford thee brass,[8]
But all turn leasers to that mongrel breed,[9]
Who, from thee sprung, yet on thy vitals feed;
Who to yon ravenous isle thy treasures bear,
And waste in luxury thy harvest there;
For pride and ignorance a proverb grown,
The jest of wits, and to the court unknown.
I scorn thy spurious and degenerate line,
And from this hour my patronage resign.

[Footnote 1: Italy was not properly the native place of St. Patrick, but
the place of his education, and whence he received his mission; and
because he had his new birth there, by poetical license, and by scripture
figure, our author calls that country his native Italy.--_Dublin
Edition_.]

[Footnote 2: Orpheus, or the ancient author of the Greek poem on the
Argonautic expedition, whoever he be, says, that Jason, who manned the
ship Argos at Thessaly, sailed to Ireland. And Adrianus Junius says the
same thing, in these lines:
"Ilia ego sum Graiis, olim glacialis Ierne
Dicta, et Jasoniae puppis bene cognita nautis."--_Dublin Edition_.]

[Footnote 3: Tacitus, comparing Ireland to Britain, says of the former:
"Melius aditus portusque per commercia et negotiatores
cogniti."--_Agricola,_ xxiv.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: Fordun, in his Scoti-Chronicon, Hector Boethius, Buchanan,
and all the Scottish historians, agree that Fergus, son of Ferquard, King
of Ireland, was the first King of Scotland, which country he
subdued.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 5: In the reign of Henry II, 1172, Dermot Macmorrogh, King of
Leinster, having been expelled from his kingdom by Roderick, King of
Connaught, sought and obtained the assistance of the English for the
recovery of his dominions. See Hume's "History of England," vol. i,
p. 380.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 6: There are no snakes, vipers, or toads in Ireland; and even
frogs were not known here till about the year 1700. The magpies came a
short time before; and the Norway rats since.--_Dublin Edition_. These
plagues are all alluded to in this and the subsequent stanzas.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 7: The University of Dublin, called Trinity College, was
founded by Queen Elizabeth in 1591.--_Dublin Edition_.]

[Footnote 8: Wood's ruinous pro