u to William Kennish's "Mona's Isle, and other Poems," a rare
book, with next to no poetic quality, and containing much that is
worthless, but having a good body of real native stuff in it, such as
cannot be found elsewhere. A still better anthology is likely to be soon
forthcoming from the pen of Mr. A. W. Moore (the excellent editor of
"Manx Names") and the press of Mr. Nutt.

It is easy to laugh at these old superstitions, so childish do they
seem, so foolish, so ignorant. But shall we therefore set ourselves so
much above our fathers because they were slaves to them, and we believe
them not? Bethink you. Are we so much wiser, after all? How much farther
have we got? We know the mists of Mannanan. They are only the vapours
from the south, creeping along the ridge of our mountains, going north.
Is that enough to know? We know the cold eye of the evil man, whose mere
presence hurts us, and the warm eye of the born physician, whose mere
presence heals us. Does that tell us everything? We hear the moans which
the sea sends up to the mountains, when storms are coming, and ships are
to be wrecked, and we do not call them the voices of the Nightman, but
only the voices of the wind. We have changed the name; but we have taken
none of the mystery and marvel out of the thing itself. It is the Wind
for us; it was the Nightman for our fathers. That is nearly all.
The wind bloweth where it listeth. We are as far off as ever. Our
superstitions remain, only we call them Science, and try not to be
afraid of them. But we are as little children after all, and the best of
us are those that, being wisest, see plainest that, before the wonders
and terrors of the great world we live in, we are children, walking
hand-in-hand in fear.

MANX STORIES

You will say that there ought to be many good stories of a people like
the Manx; and here again I have to confess to you that the absence of
all literary conscience, all perception of keeping and relation, all
sense of harmony and congruity in the Manxman has so demoralised our
anecdotal _ana_ that I hesitate to offer you certain of the best of
our Manx yarns from fear that they may be venerable English, Irish, and
Scotch familiars. I will content myself with a few that bear undoubted
Manx lineaments. As an instance of Manx hospitality, simple and rude,
but real and hearty, I think you would go the world over to match this.
The late Rev. Hugh Stowell Brown, a Manxman, brother of the most fam