Page xxi, lines 21 to 25. A well-known poet of the Fenian times has made the curious boast—'Talking of work—since Sunday, two cols. notes, two cols. London gossip, and a leader one col., and one col. of verse for the Nation. For Catholic Opinion, two pages of notes and a leader. For Illustrated Magazine, three poems and a five col. story.'

Page 1. 'The deserted village' is Lissoy, near Ballymahon, and Sir Walter Scott tells of a hawthorn there which has been cut up into toothpicks by Goldsmith enthusiasts; but the feeling and atmosphere of the poem are unmistakably English.

Page xix. Some verses in 'The Epicurean' were put into French by ThÉophile Gautier for the French translation, and back again into English by Mr. Robert Bridges. If any Irish reader who thinks Moore a great poet, will compare his verses with the results of this double distillation, and notice the gradual disappearance of their vague rhythms and loose phrases, he will be the less angry with the introduction to this book. Moore wrote as follows—

These lines are certainly less amazing than the scrannel piping of his usual anapÆsts; but few will hold them to be 'of their own arduous fullness reverent'! ThÉophile Gautier sets them to his instrument in this fashion,

Then comes Mr. Robert Bridges, and lifts them into the rapture and precision of poetry—

Page 27. 'Dark Rosaleen' is one of the old names of Ireland. Mangan's translation is very free; as a rule when he tried to translate literally, as in 'The Munster Bards,' all glimmer of inspiration left him.

Page 32, line 20. 'This passage is not exactly a blunder, though at first it may seem one: the poet supposes the grave itself transferred to Ireland, and he naturally includes in the transference the whole of the immediate locality about the grave' (Mangan note).

Page 47, line 6. The two Meaths once formed a distinct province.

Page 55, line 7. This poem is an account of Mangan's own life, and is, I think, redeemed out of rhetoric by its intensity. The following poem, 'Siberia,' describes, perhaps, his own life under a symbol.

Page 59. Hy Brasail, or Teer-Nan-Oge, is the island of the blessed, the paradise of ancient Ireland. It is still thought to be seen from time to time glimmering far off.

Page 61. Mo Craoibhin Cno means my cluster of nuts, and is pronounced Mo Chreevin KnÒ.

Page 64. Mr. O'Keefe has sent the writer a Gaelic version of this poem, possibly by Walsh himself. A correspondent of his got it from an old peasant who had not a word of English. A well-known Gaelic scholar pronounces it a translation, and not the original of the present poem. MairgrÉad ni Chealleadh is pronounced MairgrÉd nei Kealley. The Ceanabhan, pronounced Kanovan, is the bog cotton, and the Monadan is a plant with a red berry found on marshy mountains.

Page 69. A cuisle geal mo chroidhe, pronounced A cushla gal mo chre, means 'bright pulse of my heart.'

Page 74. Sir Samuel Ferguson introduces the poem as follows:—

Several Welsh families, associates in the invasion of Strongbow, settled in the West of Ireland. Of these, the principal, whose names have been preserved by the Irish antiquarians, were the Walshes, Joyces, Heils (a quibus MacHale), Lawlesses, Tolmyns, Lynotts, and Barretts, which last draw their pedigree from Walynes, son of Guyndally, the Ard Maor, or High Steward of the Lordship of Camelot, and had their chief seats in the territory of the two Bacs, in the barony of Tirawley, and county of Mayo. Clochan-na-n'all, i. e. 'The Blind Men's Stepping-stones,' are still pointed out on the Duvowen river, about four miles north of Crossmolina, in the townland of Garranard; and Tubber-na-Scorney, or 'Scrags Well,' in the opposite townland of Carns, in the same barony. For a curious terrier or applotment of the Mac William's revenue, as acquired under the circumstances stated in the legend preserved by Mac Firbis, see Dr. O'Donovan's highly-learned and interesting 'Genealogies, &c. of Hy. Fiachrach,' in the publications of the Irish ArchÆological Society—a great monument of antiquarian and topographical erudition.

Page 90, line 6. 'William Conquer' was William Fitzadelm De Burgh, the Conqueror of Connaught.

Page 91, line 4. Sir Samuel Ferguson introduces the poem as follows:—

Aideen, daughter of Angus of Ben-Edar (now the Hill of Howth), died of grief for the loss of her husband, Oscar, son of Ossian, who was slain at the battle of Gavra (Gowra, near Tara in Meath), A.D. 284. Oscar was entombed in the rath or earthen fortress that occupied part of the field of battle, the rest of the slain being cast in a pit outside. Aideen is said to have been buried on Howth, near the mansion of her father, and poetical tradition represents the Fenian heroes as present at her obsequies. The Cromlech in Howth Park has been supposed to be her sepulchre. It stands under the summits from which the poet Atharne is said to have launched his invectives against the people of Leinster, until, by the blighting effect of his satires, they were compelled to make him atonement for the death of his son.

Page 99. 'There was then no man in the host of Ulster that could be found who would put the sons of Usnach to death, so loved were they of the people and nobles. But in the house of Conor was one called MainÉ Rough Hand, son of the king of Lochlen, and Naesi had slain his father and two brothers, and he undertook to be their executioners. So the sons of Usnach were then slain, and the men of Ulster, when they beheld their death, sent forth their heavy shouts of sorrow and lamentation. Then Deirdre fell down beside their bodies wailing and weeping, and she tore her hair and garments and bestowed kisses on their lifeless lips and bitterly bemoaned them. And a grave was opened for them, and Deirdre, standing by it, with her hair dishevelled and shedding tears abundantly, chanted their funeral song.' (Hibernian Nights' Entertainment.)

Page 102. Uileacan Dubh O', pronounced Uileacaun Doov O, is a phrase of lamentation.

Page 108, line 16. 'Anna Grace' is the heroine of another ballad by Ferguson. She also was stolen by the Fairies.

Page 112, line 6. Thomas Davis had an Irish father and a Welsh mother, and Emily BrontË an Irish father and a Cornish mother, and there seems no reason for including the first and excluding the second. I find, perhaps fancifully, an Irish vehemence in 'Remembrance.' Several of the Irish poets have been of mixed Irish-Celtic and British-Celtic blood. William Blake has been recently claimed as of Irish descent, upon the evidence of Dr. Carter Blake; and if, in the course of years, that claim becomes generally accepted, he should be included also in Irish anthologies.

Page 119, line 13. 'The little Black Rose' is but another form of 'Dark Rosaleen,' and has a like significance. 'The Silk of the Kine' is also an old name for Ireland.

Page 138. Maire Bhan AstÓr is pronounced Mauria vaun a-stÓr, and means 'Fair Mary, my treasure.'

Page 140. Mo bhuachaill, pronounced mo Vohil, means 'my boy.'

Page 174. The Goban Saor, the mason Goban, is a familiar personage in Irish folk-lore, and the reputed builder of the round towers.

Page 191. SlaintÉ, ['your] health.'

Page 207. 'And their step-mother, being jealous of their father's great love for them, cast upon the king's children, by sorcery, the shape of swans, and bade them go roaming, even till Patrick's mass-bell should sound in Erin; but no farther in time than that did her power extend.'—The Fate of the Children of Lir.

Page 222. The wind was one of the deities of the Pagan Irish. 'The murmuring of the Red Wind from the East,' says an old poem, 'is heard in its course by the strong as well as the weak; it is the wind that wastes the bottom of the trees, and injurious to man is that red wind.'

Page 226. Can Doov Deelish means 'dear black head.'

Page 231. The chorus is pronounced Shoo-il, shoo-il, shoo-il, a rooin, Shoo-il go socair, ogus shoo-il go kiune, Shoo-il go den durrus ogus euli liom, Iss go de too, mo vourneen, slaun, and means—

Page 232. Shan van vocht, meaning 'little old woman', is a name for Ireland.

Page 235. This is not the most ancient form of the ballad, but it is the form into which it was recast by Boucicault, and which has long taken the place of all others.

Page 237, line 2. 'Sinking,' violent swearing.