He uses a young man as his comparison because young men are very brave and usually nave; thus they are willing to risk everything for their love. Connolly is at one with that tradition, knowing that his personal problems can, if expressed intelligently and within the context of other writers work, go beyond the particularity of the single situation and can, in the best sense of the word, delight the reader. Aside from being poor, they were governed in the main by antagonistic Protestant and Presbyterian English settlers, who themselves had a short life expectancy. Not all shanachies were old, but all were able to tell a good tale, especially when gathered around the hearth in the long winter nights. The knight preserves his dignity despite his death, though it was likely an unjust death. Tweet document.write('