Page:Through the torii (IA throughtorii00noguiala).pdf/131

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youth was a poetical passport; it is excusable, I dare say, when we find his head in a cloud-hand in many pieces of “The Rose,” where he bartered his emotion for the intellect. I am glad to hear that he returned lately to the common thought of his people; it may be a gratification for his Irish patriotism if it served to remind him of Mangan and Davis. That patriotism is another link between the Irish and the Japanese. It was from the very sense of patriotism, in truth, that “Kathleen Ni Hoolihan” was thought to be actable even in Japan; but when it failed, it was from its general symbolism, because we Japanese are able to think of patriotism only physically.

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