



Produced by David Widger





THE LITTLE MANX NATION

By Hall Caine

Published by William Heinemann - 1891


To the REVEREND T. S. BROWN, M.A.

You see what I send you--my lectures at the Royal Institution in the
Spring. In making a little book of them I have thought it best to
leave them as they were delivered, with all the colloquialisms that are
natural to spoken words frankly exposed to cold print. This does not
help them to any particular distinction as literature, but perhaps it
lends them an ease and familiarity which may partly atone to you and to
all good souls for their plentiful lack of dignity. I have said so often
that I am not an historian, that I ought to add that whatever history
lies hidden here belongs to Train, our only accredited chronicler,
and, even at the risk of bowing too low, I must needs protest, in our
north-country homespun, that he shall have the pudding if he will
also take the pudding-bag. You know what I mean. At some points our
history--especially our early history--is still so vague, so dubious,
so full of mystery. It is all the fault of little Mannanan, our ancient
Manx magician, who enshrouded our island in mist. Or should I say it
is to his credit, for has he not left us through all time some shadowy
figures to fight about, like "rael, thrue, reg'lar" Manxmen. As for the
stories, the "yarns" that lie like flies--like blue-bottles, like bees,
I trust not like wasps--in the amber of the history, you will see that
they are mainly my own. On second thought it occurs to me that maybe
they are mainly yours. Let us say that they are both yours and mine,
or perhaps, if the world finds anything good in them, any humour, any
pathos, any racy touches of our rugged people, you will permit me to
determine their ownership in the way of this paraphrase of Coleridge's
doggerel version of the two Latin hexameters--

"They're mine and they are likewise yours, But an if that will not do,
Let them be mine, good friend! for I Am the poorer of the two."

Hawthorns, Keswick, June 1891.




CONTENTS

THE STORY OF THE MANX KINGS

Islanders--Our Island--The Name of our Island--Our History--King
Orry--The Tynwald--The Lost Saga--The Manx Macbeth--The Manx
Glo'ster--Scotch and English Dominion--The Stanley Dynasty--Iliam
Dhoan--The Athol Dynasty--Smuggling and Wrecking--The Revestment--Home
Rule--Orry's Sons


THE STORY OF THE MANX BISHOPS

The Druids--Conversion to Christianity--The Early Bishops of
Man--Bishops of the Welsh Dynasty--Bishops of the Norse Dynasty--Sodor
and Man--The Early Bishops of the House of Stanley--Tithes in
Kind--The Gambling Bishop--The Deemsters--The Bishopric Vacant--Bishop
Wilson--Bishop Wilson's Censures--The Great Corn Famine--The Bishop at
Court--Stories of Bishop Wilson--Quarrels of Church and State--Some
Old Ordeals--The Herring Fishery--The Fishermen's Service--Some Old
Laws--Katherine Kinrade--Bishop Wilson's last Days--The Athol Bishops.


THE STORY OF THE MANX PEOPLE

The Manx Language--Manx Names--Manx imagination--Manx Proverbs--Manx
Ballads--Manx Carols--Decay of the Manx Language--Manx
Superstitions--Manx Stories--Manx "Characters"--Manx
Characteristics--Manx Types--Literary Associations--Manx
Progress--Conclusion




THE LITTLE MANX NATION




THE STORY OF THE MANX KINGS

There are just two ideas which are associated in the popular imagination
with the first thought of the Isle of Man. The one is that Manxmen have
three legs, and the other that Manx cats have no tails. But whatever
the popular conception, or misconception, of Man and its people, I shall
assume that what you ask from me is that simple knowledge of simple
things which has come to me by the accident of my parentage. I must
confess to you at the outset that I am not much of a hand at grave
history. Facts and figures I cannot expound with authority. But I know
the history of the Isle of Man, can see it clear, can see it whole, and
perhaps it will content you if I can show you the soul of it and make
it to live before you.