It is still the preference of the farmers that their sons should
be educated for the ministry, which in that country of multiplied
dissents has pulpits for every color of contrary-mindedness, as
well as livings of the not yet disestablished English Church. It
is not indeed the English Church in speech. The Welsh will have
their service and their sermon in their own tongue, and when an
Oxford or Cambridge man is given a Welsh living, he must do what
he can to conform to the popular demand. It is said that in one
case, where the incumbent long held out against the parish, he
compromised by reading the service in Welsh with the English
pronunciation. But the Welsh churches are now supplied with
Welsh-speaking clergy, though whether it is well for the Welsh to
cling so strongly to their ancient speech is doubted by many
Welshmen. These hold that it cramps and dwarfs the national
genius; but in the mean time in Ireland the national genius, long
enlarged to our universal English, offers the strange spectacle
of an endeavor to climb back into its Gaelic shell.
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