CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ULSTERMAN.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 196, 29 December 1876, Page 15

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ULSTERMAN.

Ihe Ulsterman is, above all things, able to stand alone, and to stand firmly on his own feet. He is called « the sturdy Northern," from his firmness and his adherence to truth and probity. He is thoroughly practical. He studies uses, respects common things and cultivates the prose of human life. The English despise the Irish as aimless, but not the Man of Ulster, who has a supreme eye to facts, and la " locked and bolted to results." There is a businesslike tone in his method of speaking. He never wastes a word yet on occasions he can speak with volubility. He is as dour and dogged on occasions as a Scotchman, with, however, generally less of that infusion of sternness— so peculiarly Scotch-which is really the result of a strong habitual relation between thought and action English tourists notice the stiff and determined manner of the Ulsterman in his unwillingness to give way to you at fair or market on the ground that one man is as good as another. The Ulsterman' no matter what his.pohtics, is Democratic in spirit; and his loyalty >» no* personal, like that of the Celt, but rather a respect for institutes. He has something, too, of the Scotch pugnacity of nimd, and always seems in conversation as if he were afraid of making too large admissions. Mr. Matthew Arnold speaks of "sweet reasonableness" as one of the noblest elements of culture and naUonal lite. Ihe Ulsterman has the reasonableness, but ho is not sweet. A Southern Irishman says of him :— "The Northerns like then- own lulls, are rough but healthsome, and, though often plain-spoken even to bluntness, there is no kinder-hearted peasantry m the world. But he is certainly far inferior to the Celtic Irishman in good manners and the art of pleasing. Though not so reserved or grave as the Scotchman, and with rather more social talent, he is inferior to the Southern in pliancy, suppleness, and bonhomie. He hates ceremony and is wanting in politeness He is rough and ready, and speaks his mind without reserve. He has not the silky flattery and courteous tact of the Southern. A Kularney beggarmsn will utter more civil things in half an hour to a stranger than an Ulsterman in all his life; but the Ulsterman will retort that the Southern is "too sweet to be wholesome" Certainly, if an Ulsterman does not care about you he will neither say nor look as if he did. You know where to find him-he is no hypocrite. The Celt, with his fervent and fascinating manner far surpasses him in making friends whom he will not always keep • while the Ulsterman, not so attractive a mortal at the outset' improves upon acquaintance, and is considerably more staunch in his tnendships. Strangers say tho mixture of Protestant fierld with good-nature and good-humor gives to the Ulsterman a tone rather piquant than unpleasing. fcike some cross-grained woods

he admits of high polish, and when chastened by culture and religion, he turns out a very high style of man. He differs from the Celt again in the -way he takes his pleasures ; for he follows work with such self -concentration that he never thinks of looking about him like the Celt for objects to amuse or excite. He has few holidays (unlike the Celt, whose holidays take all the temper out of labor), and he hardly knows how to employ them except in party processions. — c Eraser's Magazine.'