did not attend Mrs Murphy’s School and is not listed as a student of the Holy Faith School. Although she was briefly enrolled at the Metropolitan School of Art with Willie and took a course in German at the Rathmines College of Commerce in 1915, it seems likely that she was primarily educated at home.8 As her older siblings became increasingly occupied with their studies and school commitments, Mary Brigid spent much of the day on her own. Patrick’s schoolwork, in particular, claimed most of his attention and, consequently, he could not spend time with Mary Brigid reading to her or teaching her the Irish language. She fondly remembered the time they spent together in childhood, but was conscious that he was no longer a child and lamented his transition to adulthood:
Although my brother always retained his boyishness, he grew up sooner than any of us! I well remember how surprised I was – and rather contemptuous, I fear – when I first heard him call ‘mother’ instead of ‘mama’, as we all used to do before! Afterwards came a queer feeling of blankness as I began to realise that Pat was rapidly becoming – a man!9
Mary Brigid showed considerable aptitude for music from a young age and was recognised as the most musically talented of the Pearse family. As a young girl, Patrick asked her to set one of his poems, entitled ‘Mother’, to music. When Mary Brigid later performed her arrangement of the song for her own mother, ‘tears of pride and joy came into her eyes as she listened, gazing proudly and fondly upon her “boy” ’.10 Mary Brigid, Patrick and Margaret received piano lessons; Patrick, however, did not progress past simple arrangements of ‘Vesper Hymn’ and ‘Nelly Bly’. It seems that, although Patrick maintained an interest in music all his life and attended performances of operas by the German composer Richard Wagner in Dublin, he had little aptitude for music. Mary Brigid noted that, despite her best efforts to teach him, he never mastered the art of singing:
I used to try him with the scale sometimes, and the result was always excruciatingly funny! He would start off with a most tremendous seriousness and intone in rather a wavering manner: ‘Doh!’ More quaveringly still, and very much out of tune, would come ‘Ray!’ Then, with an appalling suddeness, he would go completely off the scale, and his ‘Me!’ would be at least five notes too high!11
Unlike Patrick, Mary Brigid went on to become an accomplished pianist and later studied theory and harmony with Carl Hardebeck, a noted organist, folk-song collector and leading figure in the Gaelic League and Feis Ceoil. Hardebeck was famed for his arrangements of Irish folk songs, and his style influenced Mary Brigid’s arrangements of Irish airs for voice and harp, and voice and piano, many of which are kept at the Pearse Archive in Kilmainham Gaol.
As the Pearse children grew and developed, it became increasingly clear that Patrick was the force that united them. Ruth Dudley Edwards described the children as a ‘mixed bunch’ in which ‘[a]ll the will seems to have gone into the two eldest, Margaret and Patrick, while the young pair, Willie and Mary Bridget [sic] ... were natural followers’.12 Mary Brigid and Willie may have been ‘natural followers’, but they were undoubtedly enthusiastic ones, as Patrick took a genuine interest in each of his siblings’ pursuits. Much has been written about the close bond that existed between Patrick and Willie. They attended the same school, socialised together and enjoyed pastimes such as boxing. Each of the sisters also shared interests with Patrick. Margaret and Patrick’s close bond was centred around their shared passions of religion and education. They regularly attended religious services together, such as the ceremonies of Holy Week and Forty Hours’ Devotion at St Andrew’s Church, Westland Row. Patrick and Margaret made annual visits on the 2nd of August to the Church of the Immaculate Conception, Merchant’s Quay to gain a plenary indulgence from the Portiuncula Indulgence or the Pardon Prayer of St Francis.
On one occasion, Patrick was so keen to gain an indulgence that he jumped off a moving tram after it failed to stop near the church. Unfortunately, he was injured and his face was covered in blood. Fearing that he might be stopped and questioned by police, Patrick ran home.13 Their attendance at religious ceremonies was, however, usually less dramatic. Mary Brigid and Patrick shared a love of the Irish language and Irish folklore. He fostered in her a love of the language by teaching her to read and write Gaelic script, which he had been taught at the CBS. Patrick also read aloud passages from books he studied on Irish legends, including tales about Diarmuid and Gráinne and the death of Cúchulainn.14
Each of the siblings in turn devoted themselves to whichever project Patrick was most passionate about at the time. After he completed his studies, he was appointed pupil-teacher at Westland Row. Too young to enter university, he occupied his time with the development and promotion of Irish culture and the Irish language. In 1896, he and his friend and classmate Edward (Éamonn) O’Neill formed the New Ireland Literary Society. The first of the Society’s regular weekly meetings took place on 1 December 1896 at the Star and Garter Hotel in D’Olier Street. This debating and literary society was an important forum for Patrick to showcase his talents and to hone his skills as an orator. He delivered lectures, participated in debates, gave recitations, and contributed to the Society’s journal, Debate. Topics embraced a wide range of subjects. On 19 January 1897, the debate was ‘That Ireland is Becoming Anglicised’15 and on 1 March 1898, Edward O’Neill, E.A. Murray and James Creevey debated the motion ‘That Rudyard Kipling is not a true poet’.16
Irish themes, however, generally dominated the debates. Although Willie participated in a debate in February 1898 on the motion ‘That the Milesian Invasion of Ireland as Recorded by the Bards is a Myth’, Patrick was the central and most active member of the Society,17 giving three lectures on Irish subjects between March 1897 and January 1898, including his inaugural presidential address, ‘The Intellectual Future of the Gael’, on 19 October 1897 at Costigan’s Hotel, Upper O’Connell Street.18 This lecture along with ‘Gaelic Prose Literature’ and ‘The Folk Songs of Ireland’ were published as Three Lectures on Gaelic Topics by M.H. Gill & Son in 1898.
Mary Brigid and Margaret performed at several of the Society’s social evenings. In April 1897, the sisters performed a piano duet, Whispers from Erin (c.1860) by William Smyth Rockstro. This fantasy for piano was based on two popular contemporary Irish airs, ‘Oft in the Stilly Night’ and ‘The Young May Moon’ by Thomas Moore. Mary Brigid also played an arrangement of the overture to the Lily of Killarney (1862) by Julius Benedict and was listed as the accompanist for the evening, despite being only thirteen years of age.19 The evening also included recitations by Patrick and Edward O’Neill from William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar and Hamlet. Despite the small stage and lack of costumes or backdrop, the recitations were entertaining and well received; the performances of various amateur singers, however, were less impressive.
Mary Brigid was tasked with accompanying the singers, none of whom provided sheet music for accompaniment. When she asked Patrick if he had any idea what key might best suit their voices, he replied the ‘common or garden key’.20 She informed him that there was no such key, but he reassured her that they all sang in a standard key. Baffled by his ignorance, she left him ‘blissfully unconscious of his absurdity’.21 Mary Brigid’s considerable musical ability and acute musical ear enabled her to accompany the various performers on the night by vamping along with chords. Towards the end of the evening, however, one of the soloists who impressed her with his excellent voice during rehearsal, struggled to sing in tune. She later recalled the horrific experience:
he had a nice voice. Afterwards his song would also have been very nice if he had only remained in the one key, instead of roaming through about six! For three verses of ‘The Risin’ of the Moon’ I chased him madly all over the piano, wondering which of us would break down first. By the time the moon had fully risen the piano part was ended, and I was a complete wreck! Pat’s ‘common or garden key’ seemed to have rather an elastic compass!22
The New Ireland Literary Society disbanded in 1898 because Patrick was increasingly preoccupied with his studies and his involvement in the Gaelic League (Conradh na Gaeilge), founded in 1893 by Douglas Hyde and Eoin MacNeill to preserve Irish as the national language of Ireland and to encourage the study of Gaelic
