THE IRISH SERIAL PUBLISHING COMPANY, LIMITED, (Registered under "The Companies' Act, 1862," by which the liability of each Member is strictly Capital, £2,000, in 2,000 Shares of £1 each; to be paid in Four Instalments of Five Shillings each. CERTIFICATE OF INCORPORATION. I. GEORGE CRAWFORD, Assistant Registrar of Joint Stock Companies for Ireland, do hereby Certify, that "The Irish Serial Publishing Company, Limited," is this day incorporated under the Companies' Act, 1862, and that it is a Company limited by Shares. Given under my hand this 10th day of December, Eighteen hundred and Sixty-two. (Signed,) GEORGE CRAWFORD, REGISTERED DIRECTORS: JOHN SINNOTT, Esq. ex-Mayor of Wexford, South Main WILLIAM HALY, Esq. North Main Street, Wexford. JOHN STAFFORD, Esq. South Main Street, Wexford. THE wide field of Irish Catholic Literature, between the Book and the Newspaper, is at present left, to a great extent, unoccupied. This, considering the thirst for reading that now exists, is a serious want. Apart from those indirect advantages that must be apparent to all, a first-class Catholic Magazine Literature, racy of the soil, perfectly moral in tone, instructive, and entertaining, would be an invaluable boon to our youth of both sexes, and be hailed with delight by the myriads of our fellow-countrymen, whom bad laws and their still worse adininistration have driven from the land of their affections to reside among strangers. The execution of this good work THE IRISH SERIAL PUBLISHING COMPANY, LIMITED, proposes to effect, and, to that end, asks the co-operation of the Irish Catholic Public. Our miscalled "national" schools ignore the existence of our National History, and the result is-as no doubt was contemplated-that our youth are growing up virtually strangers in the land of their birth, liable to be the dupes of every hostile or dishonest writer or speaker, and unfit for the duties of enlightened and patriotic citizenship. Such a Serial Literature as has been just adverted to, would form a convenient and agreeable medium of conveying a knowledge of the most striking and interesting portions of our Native History, and would be certain to create a taste for further research in that direction. The extraordinary success, though only in its infancy, of THE HARP, which I projected and edited in 1859-and which was only temporarily suspended, pending new arrangements commensurate with its success was a proof of the manner in which Irish Catholic readers, at home and abroad, would appreciate a genuine native literature. The Irish Catholic character is still, in many quarters, buried beneath a pile of venal and unscrupulous calumny, so that even some Irishmen have been tempted to deny their Fatherland, and we owe it to the past and to the future to vindicate it. Our illustrious men; our noble old ruins; the struggles of our fathers, pro aris et focis, and the romantic family histories and traditions connected almost with every locality in the country, would afford abundant and most interesting materials for the historian, poet, and novelist; whilst valuable information, literary and scientific, could be conveyed from sound Catholic sources. -THE IRISH SERIAL PUBLISHING COMPANY, LIMITED, is, as the above Certificate shows, now registered under the provisions of the Companies' Act of 1862, as a Company limited by Shares only, and has a Directory of honest and earnest Irish Catholics, whose sole object is to effect the end proposed in the most practical and efficient manner. For my own part, I have taken pains to make myself acquainted with all the business details, and have made the study of the History of my Country an object of primary interest for over twenty years, and intend to devote my entire time and exertions to promote, to the best of my ability, the end in view. The Company has already received the warm and practical support of several Prelates, and amongst the Members who have signed its share lists, the number of Dignitaries and Clergymen already approach a hundred; in addition to a large number of the laity, including Members of Parliament, Mayors of Cities, gentlemen of property, and wealthy merchants. The first number of THE IRISH HARP, a New Catholic Monthly Magazine, at SIX PENCE, will appear on the 1st of MARCH next, and the Company also contemplate the issue, after some time, of a Weekly Illustrated Periodical. And, as THE IRISH HARP is not intended to be either a political or polemical organ, and will be perfectly free from party or personal influences, and will have the advantage of facilities and appliances, the want of which THE HARP seriously f lt, greatly increased success may be confidently expected. The Company is not presented to the public as a medium for the investment of capital, though I believe an unusually high percentage can be paid on the small amount of capital actually required. The taking of one, or at most a few Shares, will enable any friend of Irish Catholic enlightenment to aid in forwarding a project capable of conferring so much benefit, and which can clash with no cognate existing interest, but, on the contrary, would be highly calculated to foster and sustain all such efforts, by creating and developing a taste for sound Catholic and National Literature. (By Order.) Office of "The Irish Serial Publishing Company Limited," 3, Monck Street, Wexford, 12th of January, 1863. M. J. M'CANN, SECRETARY. N.B.--THE IRISH HARP will be printed in beautiful type, on fine paper, and be brought out at one of the first Printing Establishments in Dublin. Agents required, to whom liberal terms will be given. THE IRISH HARP: A Monthly Magazine of National and General Literature. No. 1.] MARCH, 1863. THE PURITANS IN IRELAND-CROMWELL'S WARS. BY M. J. M'CANN. THE two most remarkable outbursts of fanaticism recorded in the history of the human race, occurred amongst the Saracens in the seventh century, and amongst the English and Scotch Puritans in the seventeenth; at a distance of just a thousand years. The former was founded on the Koran, and Mahomet was its leader; the latter pretended to be founded on the Bible, and had for its most remarkable embodyment and representative, Oliver Cromwell. There was a striking analogy between many leading characteristics of both movements. Rapacity and cruelty alike distinguish the followers of each. Mahomet, with the sword in one hand and the Koran in the other, desolated the finest regions of the East; Cromwell, with a sword still more unsparing, announced the alternative of the Bible-as interpreted by his Ironsides-or death, to the Catholics of Ireland; while both were equally hostile to the Cross, and held the doctrine of fatalism in common. There was however one point in which the respective disciples and followers of these fanaticisms differed materially. The Saracens were generally sincere-the Puritans still more generally were the rankest of hypocrites; while for remorseless cruelty, rapacity, and falsehood, the latter were incomparably more notorious than their eastern prototypes. We must take a rapid glance at the events [Vol. I. that ushered in the terrible epoch of which we propose to treat. Ever faithful to the faith of Patrick and the chair of Peter, the Catholics of Ireland stood unbendingly before the full force of the tide of the "Reformation." After its first fury had passed, the old religion, and most of its followers, were left stripped of everything which impious and unscrupulous men could grasp. Henry and Elizabeth had passed to their account, but their fearful deaths brought no warning to those who were red with blood of the innocent, and loaded with sacrilege and plunder. The south of Ireland, after a brave but fruitless struggle, had been desolated and "planted;" but the desperate valour and devoted fidelity of the followers of Tyrone, in Ulster, had secured some hold of the soil to the ancient septs of that warlike province. But some impenitent persecutors, and hypocritical, slavish "West Britons," will perhaps exclaim-"Oh! why rip up those old sores ?" "Why not let bye-gones be bye-gones,' and let all start anew, forgetting the errors of the past, and endeavouring to rival each other in the race of improvement and civilization for the future?" Our reply is, that were the cry sincere we would gladly hearken to it. But it is utterly insincere. And those who use it, except indeed the few denationalized individuals alluded to, are, of all others, the |