Confidential report from John W. Dulanty to Joseph P. Walshe (Dublin)
(No. 46) (Secret)

I enclose a note¹ giving the salient points of Dr. Mahr's recent Presidential address on the Pre-History of Ireland to the Society of Antiquarians of London. The address which seemed to me to be wide and comprehensive in its scope was highly creditable in regard to the activities which centre round our National Museum. From the attentive way in which it was received by the audience and from a conversation which I had later with the Keeper of the British Museum I could see that Dr. Mahr carried considerable weight with the Antiquarian Society which consists of the leading archaeologists here.

I had some conversation with Dr. Mahr on the day following the lecture and I gathered that he feels his work in the National Museum is handicapped not owing in any way to the Department of Education but to the fact that the administrative machinery, particularly the financial side, is insufficiently elastic for his work, more particularly on its research development. He is very anxious to start a new Archaeological Survey of Ireland. I understand that both the material and the men being available it would not be a very expensive thing and it would definitely put the country upon the scientific map of Europe. Dr. Mahr said that he would very much like to see the President. He recalled that only a few years ago the President honoured the Celtic Congress in Dublin with an important speech in which he said that he would promise every support to any sound scheme which could be put forward in the line of Celtic research.

Both the Minister for Education and the Secretary for Education are I understand in sympathy with Dr. Mahr's project. If it could be arranged for the President to send for Dr. Mahr it would greatly help the latter to put succinctly his proposals.