THE NATIONAL COLOR OF IRELAND.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3883, 29 December 1883, Page 4

THE NATIONAL COLOR OF IRELAND.

It is strange to be told that, aftor all, green is not tho old national color of Ireland. The popular belief for centuries is in favor of emerald color. But the old books show that the popular beliuf is contrary to the fact. There was v Duke of Ireland in Richard Il.'s lime, Robert de Vcre, Duko of Ireland and Marquis of Dublin, to whom tho King granted a coat of augmentation, "azure, flireo crowns, or with a border urgent." In Edward IV.'s time the arms of Ireland were such a problem for _t_V /o heralds that the Coinmissioiiersjv;;Vu sent to investigate and to. tt-por'h" Tho Comniissioner.sj)ifiii(..cd iU cY , that tho arms of the kuHriii-y/n , ' were three crowns in pule-. A drawing in the Hritish Museum settles the question. Tho drawing was made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and it at least registered tho colors as they existed in her reign. The national flag appears, then, to have been a harp, or with strings argent on an iizure ground. Thus in early times the national flag was certainly blue. It may bo that the color changed imperceptibly. There- are blues that aru 'almost green. Twenty years ago tho Italian tricolor was brick red, white, and olive green. These were the icsthelic tints in usuata time when Carlylo h:id not yet explained to us in a notu how Richter invented tho word "(esthetic" and what ho meant by it. Nov. , , anyone who looks at the Italian flag floating ovi.T the Iluuso of I'arliamont in tliu Piazza in Rome will see that the red is bright carmine and the green is rank enieraid.