The book of Irish poetry

Front matter

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IH

Drawn by] [Geo. Morrow

Introduction

Of anthologies of Irish verse there have been many. Miss Charlotte Brooke's " Irish Poetry," a volume of translations of her own from the Irish, led the way in the year 1789, and was followed by Hardiman's " Irish Minstrelsy," in 1 831, with metrical translations by Thomas Furlong, Henry Grattan Curran, and John D 'Alton. Both these volumes contained the Irish originals, as well as the translations from them, and both volumes were extremely valuable for their preservation of those originals, but suffered from the over ornate, and, indeed, often extremely artificial English verse into which they were translated. Highly finished that verse undoubtedly was ; here and there as fine as much of Macpherson's Ossian. But it was, as a rule, as untrue a presentment in English verse of Irish Gaelic poetry as Pope's version of the Iliad and Dryden's translation of the Aeneid are untrue expressions of the spirit and form of the Greek and Latin originals. As a matter of fact, these translators from the Irish had not learnt the lesson, not long afterwards learnt by Edward Walsh and Sir Samuel Ferguson, that the use of that poetical Hiberno-English speech, recently made popular by Douglas Hyde, Synge, Lady Gregory and others, was a far truer vehicle for the expression, in trans-

VI INTRODUCTION.

lation or adaptation, of Irish Gaelic poetry. Walsh indeed published his own translations of " Reliques of Ancient Jacobite Poetry " (1844) and his more characteristic " Irish Popular Songs " (1847), it might almost be thought, as a protest against the artificial character of previous collections of the kind, not excepting Montgomery's anthology, which preceded his second volume by a year. Dr. Drummond's " Ancient Irish Minstrelsy," translated by himself, which appeared in 1852, is an attempt to hark back to the eighteenth century and early nineteenth century formal school of poetry, but has fine passages, such as his " Cuchullin's Chariot," expanded from a passage in " The Breach in the Plain at Muirthemne."

This wise tendency to treat Irish poetry in an Irish way, through the medium of what I have already called Hiberno- English speech, was lost sight of by the Young Irelanders, whose work was, as a rule, oratorical rather than poetical, when verse became the medium, or in very large part, the medium of their political propaganda. Thomas Davis and his friends fell more under the influence of Scott and Macaulay than under that of the Gaelic poets immediately preceding them or contemporary with them. No doubt they took a pleasure in printing Irish words in Irish characters here and there in some of their national lyrics, and now and again we find, in Davis more particularly, the Irish human touch, which, when he had time to write poetry rather than verse, so distinguishes him. But as a rule the stirring appeals to patriotism on the part of the Young Ireland poets is little better than versified oratory.

INTRODUCTION. Vll

Thomas Moore was more individual as a poet than any of the Young Ireland group ; yet, whilst he undoubtedly possessed the Irish characteristics of wit and fancy, sentiment and satire, he had nothing of the spirit of the Irish countryside in his composition. Irish was not spoken by his parents or neighbours in Dublin, and when years afterwards he was seeking materials for his History of Ireland in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, he was amazed to find what a great body of Gaelic literature in prose and verse, utterly new to him, lay collected there before his eyes. The classics inspired the anacreontics of " Thomas Little " ; his poetical tales, coloured though they were by his Celtic imagination as well as by his West Indian recollections, were entirely derived from Eastern, never from Irish sources. The only purely Irish influence upon his work was that of Irish music, and that influence has made his Irish melodies, in part at any rate, imperishable.

In spite of his fine as well as faithful translations from the Irish, the influence of Byron upon Callanan is obvious, and Gerald Griffin, though much nearer to the spirit of his native soil as a poet than most of his contemporaries, was drawn, like so many young Irishmen of letters, under London literary influences, and was never more than half emancipated from them. Mangan, on the other hand, had the good fortune to be able to study in translation some of the finer specimens of Gaelic verse, and his essentially mystic genius and fine musical ear drew from that old Irish poetry a something which is lacking in the writings of his contemporaries, Ferguson and Edward Walsh alone excepted. Yet Mangan, like

Vlll INTRODUCTION.

Moore, went to the East for some of his inspiration, though, unlike Moore, he drew more of it from contemporary German poetry, which he translated, adapted and imitated with characteristic power. But Mangan at the end of his career did a hasty piece of work of a thoroughly Irish kind in his translations of the Gaelic " Poets and Poetry of Munster," for John O'Daly, the Gaelic publisher and bookseller, " few of which," as Mr. D. T. O'Donoghue, his biographer, rightly says, " are of high poetical merit." But it is only fair to add, in Mr. O'Donoghue's words, that Mangan, who did not live to see them published, " would have given them," had he survived their appearance, "as he often did with his earlier poems, an additional polish or other necessary revision."

The vulgar verse which exploited the stage Irishman before his time was transformed by Samuel Lover into a new medium for the expression of humorous character sketches of Irish life. These lyrics, written to Irish popular airs or original compositions by the author, had a great vogue in their day, and on the strength of the reputation achieved by them Lover published an Anglo-Irish anthology of Irish poetry, " Lyrics of Ireland," in 1858. Much pains has been bestowed on the collection and classification of the poems in this illustrated anthology. Its Anglo-Irish character is evident from the small proportion of either translations or adaptations from the Irish that it contains — about one poem in ten — and " sentimental " poems are too predominant in the volume. Much of it, moreover, is mere " convivial and comic, historical and political " verse, but it

INTRODUCTION. IX

is, nevertheless the most comprehensive, as well as typical collection of Irish verse that had yet appeared, and, as it claims to be, the most " national " in the widest sense of the word. Crofton Croker's " Popular Songs of Ireland " is a collection of Anglo-Irish folk songs and ballads gleaned from an unfortunately narrow field, but though much still remains to be done to supplement it, more especially in the north of Ireland, Dr. Joyce has in his Folk Song volume of 1906 added a considerable number of Irish popular ballads in the English tongue to Croker's anthology.

Meantime other anthologies of Irish poetry were seeing the light : Charles Gavan Duffy's, afterwards Sir Charles Gavan Duffy's, well-known volume of " The Ballad Poetry of Ireland," which had reached a fortieth edition in 1869 ; Hayes's two volumes of " The Ballads of Ireland " (1855), a very comprehensive but far from choice collection, and " The Harp of Erin," a small but interesting anthology, edited by Ralph Varian, and published in 1869, in which Northern writers are more adequately represented than elsewhere. To these may be added the " Spirit of the Nation," a collection of the best of the poems published in that famous political journal edited by Gavan Duffy ; and Michael Joseph Barry's collection, "The Songs of Ireland" (1845), to which Thomas Davis wrote a stirring introduction ; Denis Florence McCarthy's " The Book of Irish Ballads " (1846), and Hercules Ellis's " Songs of Ireland " and " Romances and Ballads of Ireland " (1849 and 1850) ; and William Johnston's " Boyne Book of Poetry and Song" (an Orange collection), 1859.

X INTRODUCTION.

With the exception of a volume of my own in the Mayfair Library, and, as its title (" Songs of Irish Wit and Humour ") shows, of limited scope, no anthology of Irish poetry appeared for many years, until the interesting American collection of Alfred M. Williams. The circumstances under which that anthology was compiled were remarkable. Mr. Williams, a reporter of the " New York Tribune " during Fenian days, was imprisoned in Dublin under the Arms Act for carrying a weapon which, as an American citizen, he had always been in the habit of doing. He solaced his enforced leisure by the study of Irish poetry, and eventually published, with Messrs. Osgood & Co., of Boston, his scholarly and discriminating volume " The Poets and Poetry of Ireland." This anthology had the advantage of Longfellow's criticism as it was going through the Press, and is distinguished by the interesting essays which preface most of its sections and the critical and biographical notes which deal with the more important Irish poets. Like Lover's collection, it is divided into sections relating to the various types of Irish poetry, but more stress is laid by Williams upon translations from the Irish, and, generally speaking, it may be said to be more expressive of Gaelic than Anglo-Irish genius. It was followed by Mr. T. D. Sullivan's " Emerald Gems " (1885), " The Emerald Wreath," and three American- Irish collections : " The Ballad Poetry of Ireland," in " Ford's National Library " (1886), Connolly's " Household Library of Ireland's Poets" (1887), and "The New Universal Irish Song Book " (P. T. Kennedy, 1887).

INTRODUCTION. XI

Meantime there had been a fresh flowering of Irish poetry brought about by what has been called The Irish Literary Renaissance, whose first inspirers were Sir Samuel Ferguson, Mangan, Edward Walsh, and Aubrey De Vere ; but to the influence of Standish O' Grady, through his " Heroic History of Ireland," the main impulse to this movement was undoubtedly given. Mr. Yeats might have been drawn away to lead a school of English mystic poets but for that influence, and Dr. Todhunter and other writers would probably also have been contented to cast in their lot with the English poets amongst whom they lived. Mr. O'Grady, himself an Irish scholar, though perhaps more Greek than Irish in expression, fired the imagination of his friends and drew them to the contemplation of Irish heroic themes, for which he had shown so fine a feeling. Katharine Tynan, who had fallen under the spell of Rossetti, may be claimed as a disciple of his, as may Mr. T. W. Rolleston, but undoubtedly Mr. Yeats was his greatest convert, and the founder, under his influence, of the Neo-Celtic School of Irish poetry, and, in conjunction with Lady Gregory, of the Irish Literary Theatre, on its heroic side. It is remarkable how his faithfulness to technique has impressed itself upon his followers. For like his brother poet, A.E. , he is an artist to his finger tips . If he has been blamed for the limited amount of his poetical output, he has at any rate a complete answer, that he has put artistic endeavour into every poem he has written, and that he has, as a propagandist, spoken and written more for the creation of Irish Literary and Graphic Art, and with more effect, than any Irishman of his time, and, finally, that his

XU INTRODUCTION.

latest poetical work shows a remarkable departure in fresh and advanced directions. Mr. Yeats is also one of our anthologists, and his collection, " A Book of Irish Verse," shows a more catholic taste than could have been expected from one of his own fastidious word-for-word finish.

Halliday Sparling's " Irish Minstrelsy " (1887) had its vogue before the new School of Irish Symbolists had arisen, under Mr. Yeats' aegis, and Mr. Hinkson's " Collection of Verse by members of Trinity College, Dublin " (1894), and his wife's {nee Katharine Tynan) delightful florilegium of " Irish Love Songs " also anticipated that poetical period, as to a large extent did the most ambitious and comprehensive volume of Irish verse that had yet appeared, " A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue " (1890), edited by Dr. Stopford Brooke and Mr. T. W. Rolleston, afterwards his son-in-law.

This anthology is more of a collection than a selection of Anglo-Irish Poetry or rather, as the editors describe it, " Irish poetry in the English tongue," for it contains not a few fine translations and adaptations from the Irish. It is, as it proposes to be, a compendium of poetical literature in the making, a history of Irish poetry in the English tongue, as shown by examples of every variety of it deserving critical recognition.

Another important collection rather than selection of Irish poetry, and exhibiting great pains in its gathering, is Mr. Cooke's " The Dublin Book of Irish Verse," which has the advantage of being a practically up-to-date anthology. It is arranged in the main in chronological order, and typical illustrations are given, chiefly from Anglo- Irish writers, though it also contains many good translations

INTRODUCTION. Xlll

from the Irish. It has no literary introduction and no biographical sketches of the poets represented, or such short critical estimates of their work as are to be found in the Brooke-Rolleston collection, but there are about thirty pages of useful notes referring to the sources of the poems or explanatory of the allusions in them.

Other important anthologies, and the latest in the field, are Mrs. Tynan Hinkson's and Mr. Padric Gregory's recently published volumes entitled " The Wild Harp " and " Modern Anglo-Irish Verse," respectively. The first volume, like Mr. Yeats's, contains the poems that have made a special appeal to the anthologist, poems likely " to capture for English ears, sensitive to a wild music, just such strains as might be sounded by the strings of a harp — something thin, strange, forlorn ; something a little unearthly and exquisite, else there would be no reason to garner it.'' This method of selection " shuts out reflective poetry, unless the reflection is brief and shining. It bars propagandist poetry altogether."

Mr. Gregory's anthology only deals with poems whose authors were living when his selection was made. He only asks that his poets should be of Irish blood ; he is not careful that their work should be Irish in atmosphere. He is very catholic in his taste, and introduces to his readers some half a dozen writers of finely distinctive verse whose work is either quite fresh or has been hitherto overlooked by anthologists : " John Eglinton," Helen Lanyon, Sir Samuel Keightly, Florence Wilson.

Though , partial to the ballad, and himself a master of this form of verse, he lays special stress on the symbolist lyrics of what we may call the Irish Georgian school of

XIV INTRODUCTION.

writers : Mr. Thomas MacDonagh, Mr. George Plunkett, Mr. Darell Figgis, Mr. J. H. Cousins, and Mr. Sidney Royse Lysaght. The most notable new ballad in his book is Miss Emily Lawless's " The Third Trumpet," one of the last poems she ever wrote and a very remarkable one.

While dealing with the bibliography of the subject, certain British anthologies may be mentioned which have introduced Irish verse to the general body of readers. The first and most important of these is that beautiful volume " Lyra Celtica," selected with great discrimination by Mrs. William Sharp from the best Irish, Scotch, Welsh, Cornish and Breton poetry available in the year 1896, and prefaced by a striking introduction from the pen of her husband, who, as a Celtic writer, had adopted the nom de plume of Fiona McLeod.

Next comes Mr. Brimley Johnson's charmingly illustrated four volumes of British Ballads, now to be had for one shilling in " Everyman's Library," in which there is an interesting Irish section. It has been followed by the Oxford Book of Verse, edited by Sir Quiller Couch, whose Celtic instincts have led him to admit not a few Irish poems into his volume. Conspicuous amongst the writers for the book of Georgian Poets are some writers of Irish blood, and much room has been found in Mr. Walter Jerrold's " Living Poets " for the work of Irishmen and Irishwomen.

Finally, attention should be called to two notable anthologies drawn straight from the Irish Gaelic.

Dr. Sigerson, like Miss Brooke, has preferred to make all the translations from the Irish contained in his " Bards

INTRODUCTION. XV

of the Gael and Gall." This volume appeared in 1897, but much of the work had been done in the Sixties, when, following in the footsteps of Edward Walsh, Dr. Sigerson, in co-operation with the late John O'Daly, accomplished for Munster lyrics what Dr. Hyde has since achieved for the religious and love poetry of Connacht, in his two memorable books, " The Love Songs of Connacht " and " The Religious Songs of Connacht." In this collection, which is prefaced by a peculiarly interesting as well as scholarly introduction, and contains a wealth of valuable notes, Dr. Sigerson covers practically the whole ground of Gaelic poetical literature, not only making translations in the metres and spirit of Irish verse of every kind, heroic, religious, sententious, humorous, descriptive, erotic, hitherto undealt with, but being always ready to break a lance with former translators, such as Ferguson, Walsh and Mangan, by presenting fresh versions of his own of famous Gaelic originals.

Lastly, we come to Miss Eleanor Hull's delightful volume The Poem Book of the Gael." This is written much on the same lines as Dr. Sigerson's book, but with these differences. Besides making some excellent translations of her own from the Irish, she gives her readers the best metrical translations made by the leading Irish poets of this century and the last, and by such brilliant prose writers as Mr. Standish Hayes O'Grady, Professor Kuno Meyer and Lady Gregory. She covers as much ground as Dr. Sigerson, though she does not go into as close detail in the matter of the origins of Irish verse and its peculiar metric; but she presents a very fine prose translation from her own hand of the " Saltair na Rann," a ninth

XVI INTRODUCTION.

century Irish version of " Paradise Lost and Regained," attributed to Oengus the Culdee, and never rendered into English before, and she prints in translation an interesting set of recently collected Irish Folk Poems, religious and secular, as well as translations in verse and prose from contemporary Gaelic poetry.

In what respects does my own anthology of Irish poetry differ from those described.

Roughly speaking it may be said, to be a selection of Irish Poetry, old and new, old and modern Gaelic poems in English verse translation and Anglo-Irish poetry of the last two centuries which have most appealed to me as illustrating the leading features of Gaelic, Hiberno-English and Anglo-Irish verse. I do not suggest that there are not other poems, or even many poems equal in merit to those chosen for this volume. But I have been careful to make such a selection under the seven heads which appear to me most illustrative of the special characteristics of Irish poetry as I hope will be found to yield as much variety of thought, style and metrical expression as could well be contained within the compass of from three to four hundred pages. My headings are " Nature Poetry," " Wonder Poetry," " Love Poetry," " War Poetry," " National Poetry," " Countryside Poetry," " Spiritual| and Philosophical Poetry," and " Religious Poetry."

I have been led to adopt this order of subjects for goodl reasons. The earliest Irish poetry consists of mysticall nature hymns and Nature enters largely into the poems of the Cuculain and Fenian sagas, while nature poems! pure and simple are attributed to Fionn MacCumhaill himself. But, interblent with the visible beauties of this

INTRODUCTION. XV11

world are the invisible enchantments and supernatural appearances of the fairies, the denizens of that other world which, amongst the Gaels, was neither in heaven or hell, but in intermediate space.

Love poetry finds early expression amongst the Gaels, much earlier expression from both sexes than is to be found in any other European literature. The Irish were without verse epics but their prose romances are interspersed with lyrics of many kinds, including love lyrics of poignant beauty. Amongst these may be mentioned Deirdre's Farewell to Alba, her lament over the bodies of Naisi, Ardan and Ainli, and her passionate rejection, a year later, of King Conor's attempts to win her love. The lamentation over their lovers of the two Credes, Fand's noble farewell to Cuculain and Grainne's Sleep Song over Diarmid, when they are hiding from the pursuit of Fionn, are love poems of the rarest quality.

I have placed the Irish War poetry next, because it follows naturally upon the love contests between chieftain and chieftain, and also because it stretches from pagan to early Christian times and through them, in its many moods of daring, triumph and defeat, down to the rebellion of '98, flickering out finally in Smith O'Brien's and the Fenian Rebellions.

But it was not until the tribal system had been broken for ever that there emerged that spirit of common Irish nationality which makes Irish patriotic poetry so distinctive. The love for Ireland is, no doubt, most tenderly and perfectly expressed by St. Columba, but it is not until the clans had united in common defence of the whole country and until Ireland began to be described

XVill INTRODUCTION.

by her bards by such loving names as " The Little Dark Rose," or " The Silk of the Kine," or again by such titles as " Granuaile " or " Kathleen na Houlahan," or " The Shan van Vocht " that a spirit of nationalism had been aroused sufficient to endure and bear, because it hoped for, all things. This patriotic poetry, beginning as sug gested with St. Columba carried on by Keating, the historian, in his delightful " Letter to Erin," and then spreading in every direction over Ireland and overseas with Irish exiles, is in no sense confined to poets of any particular creed or political belief. It is as strong in Emily Lawless as in D'Arcy McGee, as fervently expressec by Sir Samuel Ferguson as Stephen Gwynn or Standish O'Grady or A.E. I doubt whether there is any poetica literature in the world so suffused with this genuine love of country or in which it is expressed with more delicate feeling.

Folk songs have come to us in countless numbers frorr the Gaelic and Anglo-Irish alike, but the Gaelic Foils Songs are, without doubt, the finest. Specimens of thest have been given in translation with all the skill commanded by Mangan, Ferguson, Walsh, Dr. Sigerson Dr. Hyde, Mr. P. J. McCall, Miss Eleanor Hull, an Mr. Thomas MacDonagh. For their collection warn obligations are due to Hardiman, Edward Walsh, Dr Sigerson, Dr. Hyde, Mr. McCall, Mr. P. H. Pearse and to the Gaelic League and Irish Folk Song Society They could ill be spared, speaking as they do straigh from the heart of the Irish people.

Lastly, we have to deal with Irish religious poetry anc the spiritual and philosophical poetry which has followe

INTRODUCTION. XIX

it in recent years and which is the most remarkable outcome of contemporary Irish literary thought, unless indeed the new Irish literary drama may be said to rival it as an expression of the modern Irish mind ; though let it be noted that three of its most prominent representatives, Mr. W. B. Yeats, Mr. George Russell (A.E.) and Mr. Padraic Colum are also leading dramatists of the Irish Literary Theatre.

Early Irish Religious Poetry is remarkable, not only for its fine metrical form, but for its cheerful spirituality, its open-air freshness, and for its occasional touches of kindly humour, and the later religious poetry of O'Daly and kindred writers as preserved by Dr. Hyde, whilst of a more sombre character, is beautifully fervid and extraordinarily finished in its technique. And what may be called the wild flowers of Irish religious poetry, the short prayers, invocations and charms are as delightful, in their degree, as all readers of Dr. Hyde's Religious Songs of Connacht must confess.

And now I hand over to my readers the song wreath I have been long gathering for them. May they grow to love, as much as I do, what I have elsewhere described as : —

" These sprays of Druid oak and yew,

And Red Branch rowans hoar with dew,

And sedges sighing from the strand

Whence Oiseen rode to Fairy Land,

And festals blooms whose bardic breath

Pleasured the proud Elizabeth ;

Heath plumes that o'er our Princes sang

Exultant to the battle clang ;

XX INTRODUCTION.

Pale immortelles whose plaintive lay Still murmurs o'er their hero clay ; And wild flowers, plucked with artless art From out the Irish peasant's heart — Wood shamrocks, noineens from the lawn, The drinaun dhun and canavaun ; Arbutus from Killarney's shore, Bog myrtle, magical lusmore, And, every blossom else above, Dark Rosaleen's own rose of Love."

Alfred Perceval Graves.

Erinfa, Harlech.

A CKNOWLEDGMENTS.

The Editor and Publishers desire to thank Miss Eleanor Alexander for the use of poems by her father, the late Primate of Ireland, and by her mother, Cecil Frances Alexander, as well as for two poems of her own ; Mrs. William Allingham for permission to reprint poems by her late husband ; Mrs. George Savage-Armstrong for the like permission ; Miss Jane Barlow and George Allen and Co., for the use of Miss Barlow's poems ; Mrs. Hood for a poem by her fath&r, the late Mr. Richard Mahony ; the Hon. Frederick Lawless and Miss Venetia H. Cooper for the use of poems by the late The Hon. Emily Lawless, Lord Dunsany and the author for a poem by Francis E. Ledwidge, and Mrs. Leahy for a poem by her late husband, Mr. A . H. Leahy, M.P. ; Mr. Seumas MacManus for a poem by " Ethna Carbery " {the late Mrs. MacManus) ; Miss Nellie O'Brien for a poem by her aunt, the late Miss Charlotte Grace O'Brien ; Mr. D. J. O' Donoghue for two poems by Mr. Thomas Boyd ; Mrs. Ernest Rhys, for a poem by her sister, the late Elizabeth Mary Little ; his daughters, Mrs. Boothby and Miss Stokes, for two poems by the late Dr. Whitley Stokes ; Miss Frances Sullivan for several poems by her father, the late Mr. T. D. Sullivan ; Messrs. Chatto and Windus for two poems by Arthur O'Shaughnessy ; Messrs. Methuen for poems by Mr. Herbert Trench ; Mr. George Russell and Macmillan and Co. for poems by " A.E." ; Mr. W. H. Chesson and Messrs. Alston Rivers for poems by the late Nora Hopper {Mrs. W. H. Chesson) ; Mr. Elkin Mathews and those of the authors specified who are living for poems by Miss Alice Furlong, Mr. George A. Greene, Lionel Johnson, Mr. James Joyce, Mr. Francis Macnamara, Mr. Charles Weekes and Frances Wynne ; Messrs. Sealy, Bryers

XXU ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

and Walker for a poem by Ellen O'Leary ; Mr. T. Fisher Unwin and the authors themselves for poems by Dr. George Sigerson and Mr. W. B. Yeats ; and Mr. John Stevenson and his Publisher, Mr. Edward Arnold, for a poem.

The Editor and Publishers are also indebted to the following writers for permission to reprint their poems : Miss Eva Gore- Booth, The Rev. Stop ford A. Brooke, " WillCarew," Miss Eleanor Rogers Cox, Mrs. Edward Dowden (to whom thanks is also due for the use of poems by her late husband), Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, " John Eglinton," Mr. Francis Fahy, Mr. Darrell Figgis, Miss Moireen Fox, Lady Gilbert, Mr. Padric Gregory, Mr. Stephen Gwynn, Miss Emily Hickey, Mrs. Katharine Tynan Hinkson, Mr. Edmond G. A. Holmes, Miss Eleanor Hull, Dr. Douglas Hyde, Mr. Robert Kerr, Miss Helen Lanyon, Mr. Shane Leslie, Miss Winifred M. Letts, Mr. Sidney Royse Lysaght, Mr. P. J. McCall, Mr. Thomas MacDonagh, Miss Alice Milligan, Mr. Cathal O'Byrne, Mr. Standish O'Grady, " Moira O'Neill," Mrs. Denis O' Sullivan, Mr. Seumas O'Sullivan, Dr. George Sigerson, Dora Sigerson (Mrs. Clement Shorter), Miss Elinor Sweetman, Dr. John Todhunter, Mr. Herbert Trench, Mr. W. B. Yeats, and Miss Ella Young.

Finally and above all the Editor and Publishers have to thank Maunsel and Co., and the authors concerned for the special use of copyright poems by Mr. Joseph Campbell (Seosamh Mac Cathmhaoil) and his wife, Mrs. Nancy Campbell, Mr. Padraic Colum, Mr. J . H. Cousins, Miss Celia Duffin and Miss Ruth Duffin, Miss Susan L. Mitchell, Mr. George Roberts, Mr. T. W. Rolleston, Mr. James Stephens, and Mr. Seumas O'Sullivan, without which this anthology would have missed much of its representative character.

It is interesting to learn that these Modern Irish Poets will be more fully represented in a Volume of Irish Verses to be published bv Maunsel and Co.

Index To Authors

Page

Adamnan, Saint 343

Alexander, Cecil Frances 289,299

Alexander, Eleanor 123, 136

Alexander, William 27-29

Anonymous (English, or Translated from the Irish)

Armstrong, George F. Savage 129, 130, 131

Banim, John 233

Barry, Michael Joseph 178

Boucicault, Dion 224

Boyd, Thomas 56-58

Bronte, Emily 96, 272

Brooke, Charlotte 85

Brooke, Stopford Augustus 52, 117, 286

Callanan, Jeremiah Joseph 87, 273

Campbell, Joseph 315

Campbell, Nancy 253

xxiii

XXIV INDEX TO AUTHORS.

Page

Carbery, Ethna 55

Carew, Will 246

Carleton, William 13

Casey, John Keegan 108

Cherry, Andrew 237

Chesson, Nora {see Hopper, Nora).

Colum, Padraic 260

columkille, saint 9, 184, 337

Cousins, James H 126

Cox, Eleanor . 139

Culennain, Cormac, King and Bishop of Cashel .... 338